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Navy NEC · Medical

L19A Optician

Current service use not established

This code is listed in the directory. Inclusion alone does not confirm current service use.

A Navy Enlisted Classification: a skill designation sailors hold in addition to their rating.

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Overview

An Optician fabricates single vision and multifocal spectacles by marking, cutting, edging, and inserting lenses into frames. They measure, order, verify, dispense, repair, and replace spectacles, maintain optical laboratory equipment, and assist with diagnostic screening and the treatment of ocular disorders.

Minimum clearance: Secret

Core Skills

  • Single vision and multifocal lens fabrication
  • Spectacle measurement, verification, and dispensing
  • Optical laboratory equipment maintenance and repair
  • Ocular diagnostic screening equipment operation

Civilian Career Paths

Career associations are editorial assessments of the cited evidence, not an official crosswalk unless the evidence explicitly says so. O*NET supplies civilian occupation information, not proof of a military match. Related experience does not confer civilian qualifications. Tasks and tools below describe civilian work, not military training.

Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians

Military experience grinding, polishing, edging, and fitting prescription lenses directly overlaps with civilian ophthalmic laboratory production.

How to prepare: Prepare a work-history summary documenting the lens types, fabrication processes, and optical equipment you have handled for laboratory applications.

What the civilian work involves
  • Set up machines to polish, bevel, edge, or grind lenses, flats, blanks, or other precision optical elements.
  • Inspect, weigh, and measure mounted or unmounted lenses after completion to verify alignment and conformance to specifications, using precision instruments.
  • Shape lenses appropriately so that they can be inserted into frames.
Civilian tools and software (examples)
  • Eyeglass design software

Opticians, Dispensing

Military spectacle measurement, ordering, verification, dispensing, and repair provide direct overlap with dispensing optician work.

How to prepare: Check the relevant state opticianry board's requirements before pursuing dispensing positions. Where licensure is required, access to practice may depend on education or apprenticeship and examinations.

What the civilian work involves
  • Measure clients' bridge and eye size, temple length, vertex distance, pupillary distance, and optical centers of eyes, using measuring devices.
  • Verify that finished lenses are ground to specifications.
  • Assist clients in selecting frames according to style and color, and ensure that frames are coordinated with facial and eye measurements and optical prescriptions.
Civilian tools and software (examples)
  • Compulink Eyecare Advantage

Ophthalmic Medical Technicians

Military experience assisting eye-care clinicians and operating ocular screening equipment transfers to the equipment and examination-support aspects of ophthalmic technician work.

How to prepare: Compare your documented screening experience with a clinic's testing duties and seek supervised practice in unfamiliar ophthalmic equipment and visual-acuity procedures.

What the civilian work involves
  • Operate ophthalmic equipment, such as autorefractors, phoropters, tomographs, or retinoscopes.
  • Measure visual acuity, including near, distance, pinhole, or dynamic visual acuity, using appropriate tests.
Civilian tools and software (examples)
  • AcuityPro
  • EyeMD EMR Healthcare Systems EyeMD EMR

Notes & Sources

Evidence for this guidance (4 documents)
  1. NAVPERS 18068F Vol II (NEOCS, Jul 2026 edition): NEC L19A

    [1] NEC entry "L19A - Optician"; cached text line 7783; NAVPERS 18068F Vol II, 2026-07 edition

    Supports: Single vision and multifocal lens fabrication, Spectacle measurement, verification, and dispensing, Optical laboratory equipment maintenance and repair, Ocular diagnostic screening equipment operation, Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians (O*NET 51-9083.00), Opticians, Dispensing (O*NET 29-2081.00), Ophthalmic Medical Technicians (O*NET 29-2057.00)

  2. O*NET: Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians

    [2] O*NET 30.3 occupational data

    Supports: Ophthalmic Laboratory Technicians (O*NET 51-9083.00)

  3. O*NET: Opticians, Dispensing

    [3] O*NET 30.3 occupational data

    Supports: Opticians, Dispensing (O*NET 29-2081.00)

  4. O*NET: Ophthalmic Medical Technicians

    [4] O*NET 30.3 occupational data

    Supports: Ophthalmic Medical Technicians (O*NET 29-2057.00)

Defense contractor jobs for L19A

Descriptions may be summarized for clarity. Verify all information with your branch career counselor or official military documentation before making career decisions.

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