Practice Patent Law Without Being a Lawyer

[sanantone]

When I searched the other forum for discussions on enrolled agents, a couple of people brought up patent agents. Of course, I had to research what that was. At first when I was reading the requirements, I became discouraged; but, there is actually hope for those with non-traditional degrees and non-STEM degrees. I'll post a link to the full set of requirements, but I want to focus on non-traditional courses and non-STEM degrees. At first the requirements do say that pass/fail courses, home study courses, and correspondence courses are not acceptable; but, then they go on to say that home study courses from DETC schools and exams like CLEP are acceptable.

If you don't have one of the acceptable degrees listed, you can still qualify through work experience or by having a certain combination of credits.

i.
Option 1:
24 semester hours in physics.
Only physics courses for physics majors will
be accepted.
ii.
Option 2:
32 semester hours in a combination consisting of the following:
8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics, and
24 semester hours in
biology, botany, microbiology, or molecular biology.
The 8 semester hours in chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics must be obtained in
two sequential courses, each course including a lab.
Only courses for science or
engineering maj
ors will be accepted.
iii. Option 3:
30 semester hours in chemistry.
Only chemistry courses for chemistry
majors will be accepted.
iv. Option 4:
40 semester hours in a combination consisting of the following:
8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester
hours of physics, and
32 semester hours of chemistry, physics, biology, botany, microbiology, molecular
biology, or engineering.
(For Computer Science, see other acceptable course work.)
The 8 semester hours of chemistry or 8 semester hours of physics
must be obtained in
two sequential courses, each course including a lab.
Only courses for science or
engineering majors will be accepted.
For Computer Science, see other
"Other Acceptable Course Work."
All acceptable coursework for Options 2 and 4 must
be for science or engineering
majors.

http://www.uspto.gov/ip/boards/oed/exam/...y_2014.pdf

After looking at various sources, I've gathered that the average income for a patent agent is around $70k while the median income is around $90k. Salaries range for over $50k to over $140k.