Career Services
Making Career Choices
CAREER CENTER ADVISORS
For one-on-one advising concerning your major/career choice, you may visit with one of three Career Center Advisors in the RLC Career Center (E093).
Warren Osby
WOsby@dcccd.eduStan Katz
SKatz@dcccd.eduMatthew Ybarra
MYbarra@dcccd.edu
CHOICES ASSESSMENT SYSTEM & DISCOVER - Decide where you want to go
If you're majoring in accounting, nursing, elementary education, or some other “career-track” major, you'll most likely choose to be an accountant, nurse, elementary school teacher. Your decision is pretty straightforward, unless you wish to look beyond your major's traditional career fields.
But, if you're majoring in history, English, philosophy, or some other “noncareer-track” major, your decision isn't so clear. You could find yourself working for a large corporation, a museum, a social services organization, a hospital, a government agency, or a technology company. Regardless of your major, it is important to clarify your career goals. One way to approach this decision is to break it down to “what” you want to do and “where” you want to do it.
The “what deals with the skills you have and enjoy using. The “where” relates to where you want to use those skills. For example, if you have sales skills (the “what”), you must determine where you want to put them to use. Selling insurance is different from selling a college as an admissions representative. Both jobs require sales skills but are conducted in different environments. You may be sure you want to work in the education field (the “where”), but can't decide whether to become a teacher, counselor, administrator, or curriculum developer (the “what”). To clearly identify what you want to do and where you want to work, it's important to learn more about yourself and explore the world of work.
The first step in Career Planning should be to gather information about yourself to assist in making a decision about a career. You should develop an understanding of self-including values, interest, aptitudes, abilities, personal traits, and desired life style, and become aware of the interrelationship between self and occupational choice.
Step two involves Academic/Career Options which allows individuals to investigate the world of work in greater depth, narrow a general occupational direction into a specific one through an informed decision making process, and declare a major.
Step three in this process will require you to evaluate occupational choices and gain practical experience through Internships, cooperative education, relevant summer employment, volunteer work and campus activities. In addition, more specific decisions about occupational choices are made.
Step four: Job Search / Graduate School Preparation an initial occupational choice is made in this step of choosing a career. You prepare for and begin conducting a job search, or apply to graduate or professional schools.
