Iowa·Office and Administrative Support Occupations·SOC 43-4071

Best File Clerk programs in Iowa, ranked by enrollment

File correspondence, cards, invoices, receipts, and other records in alphabetical or numerical order or according to the filing system used.

1 schools in Iowa run programs that feed this job, graduating 2 people a year. The job pays a median of $46,560 in Iowa across about 430 jobs (BLS OEWS May 2025).

Also calledClerkFile ClerkRecords ClerkOffice AssistantFilerListerIndexerCut Filer
Graduates / yr
2
in Iowa
Median pay · Iowa
$46,560
BLS OEWS May 2025
Jobs in state
430
people employed
Schools
1
with a feeder program
Avg graduation rate
39%
across those schools
Median net price
per year, IPEDS

Fields of study in Iowa that lead to this job

Grouped at the 4-digit CIP level. Numbers are graduates per year in this state.

1 programs in Iowa that lead to this job

Ranked by graduates per year in Iowa (IPEDS completions). Graduate earnings and debt are national College Scorecard figures reported at the 4-digit CIP level, so specializations within one field share a figure. Each program also links to its own Iowa page.

Degree programs that lead to this occupation, ranked by graduates per year
#ProgramGraduates / yrShare of pipelineSchoolsGrad earnings (1 yr)Median debt
1
CIP 52.0408In Iowa
2
100.0%
1$25,993$9,500

Top 1 schools in Iowa

Ranked by graduates per year into this job. Graduate earnings are reported for 0 of the 1 schools in this state.

Schools ranked by graduates per year into this occupation
#SchoolGraduates / yrTop feeder programGrad earnings (1 yr)Grad rateNet priceAcceptance
1Des Moines Area Community College
Ankeny, IA Public · 1 feeder programs
2General Office Occupations and Clerical Services39%

All 1 schools in Iowa

Every school in Iowa with a program that feeds this job, ordered by graduates per year. Earnings are shown for the ranked schools above; open a school profile for the rest.

All schools in Iowa that feed this occupation
SchoolCityControlGraduates / yrFeeder programs
Des Moines Area Community CollegeAnkenyPublic21

What file clerks earn in Iowa

What people already working in this job earn (BLS OEWS May 2025). Not graduate earnings.

Median annual in Iowa
$46,560
Mean annual
$47,070
Jobs in state
430
What the range looks like
10th pct$33,390Median$46,56090th pct$63,480
Versus the national median
+6.8%

U.S. median $43,600. Iowa pays above the national figure.

Job concentration
0.58×

1.00× means the state has its expected share of these jobs.

Metro areas in Iowa

Waterloo-Cedar Falls, IA
$48,490median
50 jobs
Cedar Rapids, IA
$49,460median
90 jobs
Des Moines-West Des Moines, IA
$49,810median
80 jobs
Davenport-Moline-Rock Island, IA-IL
$41,360median
40 jobs

Job outlook

Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections, 2024 to 2034.

Projected growth 2024–34
-15.9%
Decline
Openings per year
7,300
new jobs plus replacements
Employment change
-13,400
84,300 → 70,900
Typical entry education
High school diploma or equivalent
Plus short-term on-the-job training

Growth and openings are national. The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish employment projections at state level, so these figures describe the occupation across the whole U.S., not this state alone.

How to get in

The full skills, tools, and day-to-day breakdown lives on the national File Clerks page.

How to become a File Clerk

Job zone 2 of 5 · SVP Below 6.0
Typical entry education
High school diploma or equivalent
On-the-job training
Short-term on-the-job training

Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.

Some occupations may need little or no previous experience; others require several months to a year of experience. For example, landscaping and groundskeeping workers might require very little training or previous experience, while agricultural equipment operators can benefit from on-the job training.

Ranges from a few days to one year of on-the-job training.

Top skills

Reading ComprehensionActive ListeningSpeakingWritingMonitoringCritical Thinking

The same job in other states

Where else this occupation employs the most people, and what it pays there.

Related careers in Iowa

Every major mapped to this job

The official federal mapping behind the rankings above.

All 1 majors mapped to File Clerks1 of them graduated someone in the latest IPEDS year. NCES CIP 2020 → SOC 2018 crosswalk.+
  • 52.0408General Office Occupations and Clerical Services

Common questions

Answers for people weighing file clerks programs in Iowa.

What degree do you need to become a File Clerk?+

High school diploma or equivalent is the typical entry-level education BLS reports for this occupation. The most common program people actually graduate from is General Office Occupations and Clerical Services, which awarded 2 degrees in Iowa in 2024-25, 100.0% of everyone graduating from a program that feeds this career.

Which college majors lead to becoming a File Clerk?+

The NCES CIP-to-SOC crosswalk maps 1 programs to this occupation. The largest are Business Operations Support and Assistant Services. Together they graduate about 2 people a year in Iowa.

How much do file clerks earn in Iowa?+

The median is $46,560 a year (BLS OEWS May 2025). That is 6.8% above the U.S. median of $43,600. This is pay for people already working in the occupation, not the same thing as graduate earnings one year after finishing a degree.

Is demand for file clerks growing?+

BLS projects a -15.9% change in employment between 2024 and 2034, decline, with roughly 7,300 openings a year nationally once retirements and job changes are counted.

How many schools offer programs for this career in Iowa?+

1 institutions in Iowa reported graduates from at least one of the 1 programs that feed this occupation in IPEDS 2024-25. Rankings on this page use graduates per year, because the federal data publishes no enrollment count by program.

What other job titles do file clerks work under?+

Employers advertise this work under many names. O*NET records Clerk, File Clerk, Records Clerk, Office Assistant among the most commonly reported, all mapping to SOC 43-4071.

About the data on this page

Rankings use IPEDS completions 2024–25, degrees awarded per year. That is the closest federal measure of how many people a program puts into a career, because no federal dataset publishes enrollment by program. Wages and employment come from BLS OEWS May 2025, growth and openings from BLS Employment Projections 2024-34, and which majors lead to which jobs from the NCES CIP 2020 to SOC 2018 crosswalk. Occupation descriptions, tasks, skills and tools are O*NET 30.3 (CC BY 4.0, U.S. Department of Labor/ETA).

  • BLS Occupational Employment & Wage Statistics

    May 2025

    Wages, employment counts, location quotients and metro breakdowns.

  • BLS Employment Projections

    2024–34

    Projected growth, annual openings and typical entry-level education.

  • IPEDS Completions

    2024-25 (provisional)

    Graduates per year by program and institution — the ranking metric.

  • College Scorecard, Field of Study

    2020-21 cohorts

    Median graduate earnings one year after completion, and median debt.

  • Census Post-Secondary Employment Outcomes

    latest available

    Graduate earnings 1/5/10 years out, where the state participates.

  • NCES CIP 2020 and the CIP-to-SOC 2018 crosswalk

    CIP 2020 / SOC 2018

    Which college programs officially lead to this occupation.

  • O*NET Database 30.3

    30.3

    Tasks, skills, knowledge, tools, job zone and alternate job titles.

    Official source →CC BY 4.0, U.S. Department of Labor / ETA

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