By Helen Davies

When it comes to introducing the concept of career development to younger audiences, I felt compelled to share a recent story of my experience with Grade 7 and 8 students.

As an active parent volunteer at my children’s school, I was intrigued to receive a letter last month from the school requesting volunteers to come in and talk about their occupations with the students (Grades JK through 8) as part of their Education Week Career Day. As a part time student in the Career Development Practitioner Program at Conestoga College, I did not feel it appropriate to actually present the occupation of “Career Counsellor”, but was certainly interested in the day’s events. The first question that came to mind was whether or not anyone was actually taking the time to present the concept behind the idea of Career Day. I approached the school committee organizing the event, and suggested that there might be an opportunity to work with the students in actually introducing the idea of career exploration and involving the students in an activity. The key question at this point was deciding the most appropriate age for this. For the younger audiences, seeing the fireman come in to present his job and equipment, and talk about his role in the community is visual and effective. For those who were 13 or 14, I felt that actually getting the students involved in an activity might stimulate more thought, especially given that the Grade 8’s would be graduating and off to high school a few months later where they would be having to make some key educational decisions. My proposal was warmly welcomed.

I embarked on preparing a 30-minute session that would run 3 times back to back for students in grades 7 and 8. I thought about a number of activities that would really engage the students, as well as address differences in ability and interest levels, including things like card sorts, or even a dream exercise. However, given the limited session time, and the fact that I really wanted the students to feel they had achieved something by the end of it, or at least found out a little more about themselves, I had to be very selective about the activity to include. I started the session with a very short presentation to introduce the idea of career exploration, and the kinds of activities they could engage in to that end. I kept my slides simple yet colourful, and invited my audience to give feedback and share some of their work experiences to date with one another. I was then keen for the students to experience some exploration for themselves. I prepared 2 tutorials for self-assessment quizzes from 2 different youth oriented websites, www.tvo.org – Career Matters, and http://www.calgary.ca/CSPS/CNS. The school itself had access to Career Cruising, but as this site requires a licence, I deliberately chose sites that the students could access from home, and ones that would be less familiar to them. In addition to the tutorials, I also compiled lists of other resources for students to take away along with the presentation to share with parents or to refer to in the future.

My goal for Career Day was simple but twofold: To introduce students to the idea of getting to know themselves better and of finding out about the world of work, and indeed knowing where to access this kind of information; and secondly, to create a kind of “baseline” of career awareness that would hopefully be reinforced over time. I believe I was successful in achieving the first part. The sessions were very well received by the students who seemed to enjoy the “hands on” element of the quizzes and the fact that they provided immediate results, and a springboard for more specific occupational research. Furthermore, the school principal was keen to share my presentation with other principal colleagues for use with students and as a tool for teachers in identifying new resources to help them when discussing educational and career decision making with their students. As far as the second part of my goal is concerned, only time will tell. Hopefully, these students will receive the necessary guidance to build on this early awareness and better equip themselves in making more informed educational and career-related choices in the future – ultimately making their transition into the world of work more deliberate, and hopefully more rewarding. Encouraging this process on a broader scale as part of Education Week, and utilizing relevant and interesting tools to relay our message will certainly help in giving these young people a good head start.

Helen Davies is a student in the Career Development Practitioner Program at Conestoga College, Kitchener, ON. She has a BA Honours degree in Business and French and has 9 years’ experience in international marketing and public relations. She has worked in the UK, France and the US, and emigrated to Canada from the UK 4 years ago.