What is Career Counseling?
Career Counseling is aimed at helping you determine your strengths, values, and interests in order to make choices regarding your career or major. It is a collaborative partnership between you and your counselor. You are an expert on yourself, while your counselor is an expert on career exploration and decision-making.
Because every student’s career exploration needs are unique, the counselor will listen to you and ask questions to help determine: (1) the goals you want to achieve with the help of counseling and (2) a concrete plan for achieving those goals. This plan will serve as a flexible guide for the things you and your counselor will talk about, the career assessments you will take, and the career exploration tools you will acquire.
Who can benefit from Career Counseling?
A variety of students can benefit from career counseling.
- Are you having trouble choosing a major?
- Despite switching majors, are you still unable to find a major that “fits”?
- Do you want to figure out what career/occupation/job you should to go into after graduation?
- Do you want to know if graduate/professional school is right for you?
- Do you want to find tools to help you make a career-related decision?
- Do you want to take assessments/tests to help you better understand your interests, skills, values, and personality so you can choose a major or career?
- Do you want to create a career plan that will help you make informed, thoughtful career-related decisions?
What will I discuss with my Career Counselor?
The career counseling we provide is holistic, flexible, and confidential. You and your counselor will work together to determine what’s most important to discuss and do each session. Here are some of the topics that students frequently discuss with their counselors:
- Their interests, skills, values, personality attributes, cultural background, and past and present relationship experiences
- How each of the above factors influence what majors, careers, and graduate/professional training might be a good fit for their career aspirations
- How to understand and overcome difficulties in making career-related decisions
- How to interpret and learn from various career assessments they complete, including the Strong Interest Inventory (career interests), Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (personality), Career Lifeline, and various Card Sorts
- How to manage their parent’s expectations regarding majors and careers, and how to talk with their parents about these topics
- How to effectively cope with the stress, sadness, and anxiety associated with career exploration and other life circumstances
- Whether personal, family, or cultural factors may be affecting their career decision process, and how to sort through these difficult issues