Chapter 8

One of the enjoyments that I receive from learning about career counseling, is how my own career development was influenced by the same tactics described in chapter eight. Looking back at all of the career fairs, and post-educational fairs that my high school provided, was a gateway to my exploration into a field that I have chosen to seek after. I think it is imperative that public school systems continue to provide career days for students with direct contact with representatives of higher-educational institutions, businesses, and government agencies, so they can learn more about the available options out there for them.

After analyzing the status attainment theory of Hotchkiss and Borrow (1990, 1996), it appears evident that the socioeconomic status of one’s family influences the occupation that one enters. Therefore, children seem to be limited to knowledge about careers to the knowledge of their parents. Career days and work experience programs in the school setting, is of utmost importance, because these outlets may be the only opportunities where self-exploration can occur in terms of the career choices that are available to them.

Looking at Super’s Life-Span Theory, the nature of one’s career pattern is not only influenced by parental socioeconomic level, but is influenced by the readiness that one has to face the challenges and problems in career decision making (Brown, 2012). Children and adolescent’s appear to have a pre-conceived notion about the pathway of education to job attainment, being a linear one without any challenges or obstacles that could be in the way of achieving their goals. It is important for career counselors to create some sort of realistic picture for young people about the nature of work, the qualifications needed for a specific profession, in efforts of developing one’s career. Helping students practice resume writing, and interviewing skills is a good way for them to understand the hiring process, and the competitiveness among the work force. I think there are too many young people that forget about this reality, which doesn’t reinforce the idea of being proactive in their career development, and in turn, makes them think that everything is just supposed to happen. As career counselors, by empowering students to have positive self-efficacy beliefs and providing the tools to be successful, and prepared when an opportunity does come, will result in happenstance and synchronicity in their life processes. Over all, preparing students for the unexpected, and giving them a sense of hope will lead to positive outcomes in one’s life.  

Brown, D. (2012). Career information, career counseling, and career development (10^th ed.).        New York: Pearson Education Inc