Fred Lassiter is unusual among the students at Forsyth Technical Community College.

Most of his classmates weren't even born when he left the Navy in 1979, and he is the only man in the certified-medical-assistant program.

'Most of the students are half my age or younger,' said Lassiter, 47, 'but that's never bothered me. I've never worried about that because, I found out, that I'm going to very marketable because I am a man.'

He said that the number of jobs in his new field - which can pay $11 to $15 an hour - far exceeds the number of people qualified to take them.

'It's been so lucky for me to fall into it the way I have,' he said.

Certified medical assistants, he said, are not nurses. CMAs work in doctors' offices and prepare patients to see doctors. They check height, weight, blood pressure and pulse rate, or they might take blood.

'Most of the people we will be working with will be senior citizens,' he said. 'You have to show a loving, caring attitude, and they've really drilled that into our heads. We've taken everything from biology courses to algebra. We've taken coding. We're taking transcription now, where the doctor's talking into earphones and you have to type what he says. We've already had two other typing classes.

'We're having a laboratory-procedures class where we're learning to draw blood. Exam-room procedures, we've had two classes of that. We've had the other standard courses like biology, English, the humanities.'

Lassiter isn't the first man to try Forsyth Tech's CMA program, but he is hoping to become the first to graduate with the CMA associate's degree.

'I hope that I can show other men that this is where to go, this is where jobs are at,' Lassiter said. 'To me, it's nothing a man can't do if he sets his mind to it. If ladies can be mechanics, why can't I do this?'

Van Wilson, the vice president of student-development services, said that Forsyth Tech's fall enrollment for 2003 was more than 7,350, an increase of 10 percent over the fall of 2002.

The sluggish economy, with increased numbers of displaced workers, is one factor in the increase, he said. Other factors, he said, are new programs, more people looking at the community college as a viable alternative to costlier four-year schools, and a growing number of students graduating from state high schools.

Lassiter had worked at AMP Inc. in Greensboro for 22 years, mostly in shipping and receiving. Not long after the company was bought out by Tyco Electronics, he was told he was being laid off. That was October 2001 -- he left the job two months later.

'I was devastated at first,' he said. 'But then I was happy. It was an opportunity.'

He said he immediately thought of going back to school, but he wasn't sure what he would do. After first looking at Guilford Tech, he picked up a Forsyth Tech brochure. The certified-medical-assistant program looked appealing, he said, because the field has a tremendous need for help - there is little chance of being laid off.

'They won't look at my age, because they need me,' Lassiter said. 'My health is good. I'll be able to give somebody 18 good years. So I've never worried about my age in this aspect.'

But his age does come to mind. 'I didn't go to college before, and although my parents are gone, they would be so proud of me because I'm going to get my college degree. I was in the Navy, spent time overseas, just missed Vietnam, actually.'

Still, Lassiter said he must remember why he's there.

'I'm not going to fail,' he said, 'but if I did fail, I don't get another chance. I don't want to get another job at a plant.''