Fisheries and Aquaculture Sciences - AAS
Get paid to do what you love with an AAS in Fisheries & Aquaculture Sciences. With a >90% graduate placement rate, this program is designed to give you the training necessary to begin your career in salmon and trout hatchery operations, fisheries management, or sustainable seafood production. The Fisheries & Aquaculture Sciences program is the only two-year college on the West Coast to offer technical training in shellfish hatchery operations and the only Washington State college with its own Department of Fish and Wildlife salmon hatchery program.
Upon completion of the AAS, students also receive the Fisheries & Aquaculture Techniques Certificate of Completion.
Employment Information
Data are provided on a program (not credential) level
63%1 BTC graduate placement rate (Employment Security Department- WA and OR only)
96%3 BTC graduate placement rate (faculty-tracked, national)
78%3 BTC in-field graduate placement rate (faculty-tracked, national)
$46,473 starting annual wage2
$53,133 average annual wage2
$64,731 potential annual wage2
- Employment and Wage Data Sources and Information
1Employment data come from the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) and reflect WA/OR employment for students enrolled at BTC between 2017-18 and 2019-20. Students are included in the employment rate if they left with a credential. Rates are not shown for programs with fewer than 10 students meeting the above criteria.
2Whatcom County and WA State wage data come from Washington State Employment Security Department (ESD) 2021 Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates and reflect 2018-21 employment. Wage data represent occupations that BTC faculty have identified as the most relevant career paths for program graduates. Note that these wages reflect employees with varying educational levels/credentials. For cases in which multiple occupations have been identified by faculty, a weighted percentile is calculated using each occupation’s percentile wage and employment size estimate. Wages are not shown for programs for which occupations do not meet the ESD’s minimum thresholds for publishing. If the program has wage data from the Washington SBCTC that involves shift work, these ESD wages reflect the same number of hours used in the annual wage calculation. Starting wage = 25th percentile, median wage = 50th percentile, wage potential = 75th percentile.
3Additional employment rates are provided for programs with faculty who maintain their own employment records of students who graduated between 2017-18 and 2019-20 and who were employed within 9 months of graduation. Both overall and in field of study employment rates are included, respectively. For these programs, the format follows: ESD rate / faculty-tracked overall rate / faculty-tracked in-field rate. These additional, faculty-provided rates are particularly important for programs that tend to have graduates employed outside of WA and OR. Note that due to lack of available data, rates may represent fewer than 3 years of graduates.
Estimated Program Costs