Pros
-Every other Friday off (work 9 hours Monday through Thursday, 8 hours every other Friday for an 80 hour 2-week pay period) -Access to all Aberdeen Proving Grounds (APG) facilities, including a gym, pool, equipment rental, and clinic -Harford county is small, mostly suburban and rural, a positive for some people -Government benefits are excellent, but vary according to grade -ATC is the top testing center in the nation for automotive testing
Cons
-ATC is a very old organization, built in 1918, so the center is falling apart. Power outages, equipment failures, and old buildings are all problems, and APG doesn't receive enough money to fix them. -There is a 'good ol' boys club' at ATC that is very hard to get into or over. Many people have gotten jobs there through family and friend connections, and many of the staff are married to each other. As an outsider, it's difficult to impossible to get a job if you're a fresh grad from college with no connections to the test center. -Like other government jobs, change is a very hard to impossible thing to implement, due to stubborn management and a slowly dwindling budget, as evident by the crumbling infrastructure and the testing equipment and methods dating back to the 90's