Our career exploration and planning guidebooks (which will include a general guidebook and multiple career-specific guidebooks) provide a four-phase career exploration and planning process to help students choose and explore their desired career path, specifically to enter a career that provides a sense of purpose and meaning to their lives. This four-phase process involves self-exploration and discovery of core values and interests, conducting an in-depth analysis of a broad career field of interest, choosing and exploring a career specialty, and developing an extensive education and career plan. The Cognitive Information Processing (CIP) model serves as the basis for all career exploration and planning guidebooks.

Written specifically for pre-teens and teens, our social and emotional learning workbooks will empower students with the knowledge, skills, and mindsets to address the barriers that they must overcome to reach their college and career goals. The workbooks will help students form healthy identities, feel and show empathy for others, and establish and maintain supportive relationships. Additionally, students will be provided with the tools to make informed, responsible decisions, manage their emotions and impulses, and control negative thoughts and feelings. The overall message and examples used in workbooks will be relevant to the academic and non-academic issues pre-teens and teens deal with along with recommendations on how to approach dealing with them.

Our career simulation workbooks provide students with hands-on experience with a variety of careers to help them learn about various career paths to discover their future career interests. The career simulations will help students consider which careers are of interest and utilize provided career exploration and planning resources to explore their career interests in more depth. The goal is to provide true-to-life career simulation exercises that help students consider the following questions: What are my career interests? How do my career interests and core values translate to potential careers? What are my career options? Which careers haven’t I considered?

After completing career simulation exercises, students will be able to determine if they would like to further pursue the career field before committing energy and time to explore the career in more in-depth.

Our college readiness workbooks will provide students with the mindsets, tools, and resources to help them enter and complete a postsecondary education degree or career training certificate or licensure program, specifically to enter careers that provide a sense of purpose and meaning to their lives.

Our career readiness workbooks are intended to help students enter the workplace with the knowledge and skills needed to find, acquire, maintain, and grow within a job in today’s modern workforce. The workbooks will include content such as developing an effective resume and cover letter, completing job applications, developing networking and interview skills, and developing a mindset that will drive success.

Our academic skills development workbooks will help students become autonomous, self-regulated learners who are equipped with transferable skills for success in college and the workplace. The workbook will include a wide range of academic skills content, such as time management, note-taking, memory and concentration, overcoming procrastination, goal setting, textbook reading, and exam preparation techniques, to help students acquire new learning strategies, improve academic performance, and become a more effective learner.

Our career exploration and planning textbook is an inclusive, integrated system of career exploration and planning learning activities intended to improve postsecondary outcomes for all students – especially among underserved populations. The textbook will provide a curriculum to implement college and career readiness programming in K-12 schools and districts as well as two and -four-year colleges with respect to preparing all students to choose careers that provide a sense of purpose and meaning to their lives. We will present four different editions of the textbook, written specifically for elementary, middle, high school, and college students.

This workbook outlines a straightforward personal strategic action planning approach and incorporates the following components:

• Conducting a self-assessment and 360-degree review of core values and interests
• Conducting a career field analysis
• Conducting a skills gap analysis
• Conducting an in-depth analysis of a career specialty
• Writing a personal mission statement
• Developing career-focused SMART goals
• Creating action steps that align with each SMART goal
• Identifying costs, potential barriers, and roadblocks
• Building your action plan
• Implementing your action plan
• Evaluating your progress

NAPCA’s Ten Components of College and Career Readiness has been created to guide school counselors and college and career counselors while implementing college and career readiness programming in K-12 schools. The components are considered a systemic approach for school counselors to “build aspirations and social capital, offer enriching activities, foster rigorous academic preparation, encourage early college and career planning, and guide students and families through the college admission and financial aid process.