Switching from MSAccess to Oracle. What is the best career path?

>> live in the Washington, DC area

I'm ~100 miles south of you (Richmond,Va.) DC is one of the top metro areas in the world for Oracle jobs if not the number one. It's one of the few areas where you can easily find IT entry level jobs. Go right now to dice.com and search for: ENTRY ORACLE or JUNIOR ORACLE, under DC metro area and you'll find plenty of jobs whereas other areas return nothing. You also have main Oracle offices close to you, such as the one in Reston, Va where you can go and register for training directly from an Oracle intructor. So, I wouldn't hesitate switching to Oracle.

>> Also, how much shouid I spend on training?
Getting your training directly from an Oracle intructor is expensive but well worth it (the best of the best). You can opt for online training through Oracle's website which is less expensive, but you won't have that special attention or self-study CD-ROMs whereyou will be on your own. --You should carefully consider the tradeoffs here.

http://education.oracle.com/pls/web_prod-plq-dad/db_pages.getpage?page_id=3&p_org_id=1001&lang=US

If you don't have a bachelor's degree, then you may consider Strayer University (you should have one nearby.) They are part of the Oracle workforce development group and have programs with emphasis in Oracle's development and management.

>> What is consider excessive and what is a good bargain?
Most Oracle trainings are excessive, however it's one of the best-paid skills in the market today...

A good bargain: go to eBay and buy Oracle University books for a low price.

Good luck!

A great place to start with selflearning is:

http://www.oracle.com/pls/db102/homepage?remark=tahiti

Each tab lists different books.

The first tab is a good start: "Getting started"