9.3 - Career Exploration (1 hour)

Career Exploration

Purpose

The purpose of this activity is to explore the different careers options that exist and find a few that fit your interests and needs.

Objectives

In this assignment, you will gain the following skills & knowledge:

• Learn about interesting jobs with a bright outlook and potential employment
• Know the income you can expect to earn in a career you chose to explore
• Become clear about how much education you need in order to obtain the job you want to have

Outcome

The objectives in this assignment will prepare you to:

• Explore career options

Directions

Step 1: Education Levels 

1. Think about how much time you are willing to spend in school before beginning your career.

2. Look at the chart below to determine what level of education you can expect to achieve in that amount of time.

3. Decide how much time you want to spend in college before beginning your career.

*College students enrolled in a minimum of 12 credits are considered full-time students.

Step 2: Job Information

When you go online, you will search for 5 occupations that interest you.  For each occupation, you will need the following information:

• Name of career cluster
• Name of occupation
• Education requirements
• Nearby training option
• Average salary

Step 3: O*NET Online

1. Go to: https://www.onetonline.org/

2. Click on: Find Occupations

3. Go to: Career Clusters and click on the down arrow

4. Click on a Career Cluster that interests you & click on: Go 

5. Look for careers with a Bright Outlook sun next to them.

6. Click on an Occupation that interests you.

7. At the top, click on: Easy Read

8. Click on: Yes, let's go

9. Read over job description and watch the Career Video if you want.

10. Look at the EDUCATION section to find out the education level required.

11. If this matches the amount of time you want to spend in college, click on: Find Training

12. Enter your ZIP Code or State then click on: Go

13. Look at the nearby training options.

14. Go back to the previous page and look at the JOB OUTLOOK.

15. Click on: Local Salary Info

16. Enter your ZIP Code or State then click on: Go

17. Look at the local salary info for the career.

Step 4: Career Exploration Questions

1. Click on Take the Quiz below

2. Answer the questions about the occupation you found on O*NET.

3. When you complete Question #1, go back to O* NET.

4. Go back and select another career from the list or go back more to choose a different career cluster.

5. Each time you find a career that interests you, go to the quiz below & answer the questions.

6. There are a total of 5 questions on this quiz, so you should find a total of 5 occupations

Criteria

This assignment is worth 25 points. There are a total of 5 questions. Each question is worth 5 points. Each question has 5 parts:

1. Name of career cluster
2. Name of career
3. Education requirements
4. Nearby training option
5. Average salary

To receive full points for each question, give all the information asked for in the question.

Example Answer

1. Health Science
2. Nursing assistant
3. High school diploma
4. Skagit Valley College
5. $29,660