Career Exploration for High Schoolers

Dear High school students,

We know how stressful and confusing it feels as you try to discover who you are and what you want to do when you grow up. Let’s face it — who really knows what field you want to study when you’re 16 or 17, right? You may have a bunch of ideas, but you also know you don’t know what else is out there since your experience is limited — and that’s okay. That’s where we can help.

Check out these tips from our experts at TeenLife on how to navigate your career options:

Lean into your personal interests and passions 

Love sports? Look into majoring in programs like sports management, physical therapy, or sports medicine. Enjoy puzzles, problem-solving, and math? Check out coding or computer science jobs.

It’s good to participate in multiple extracurricular activities that you are genuinely interested in throughout high school — think clubs, sports, volunteering, or internships — that will provide relevant skills and experiences.

Most high schools have a debate team and compete against other schools. Joining the debate club in high school is perfect for someone who enjoys public speaking, or even just wants to get better at it! With debate, you must be confident and able to think on your feet. People who join the debate club often go off to study law and become lawyers or explore paths in political science. Even if you don’t end up in one of those fields, the skills learned at the debate club are valuable in any field and will make you a more well-rounded person.

If you love theater but aren’t sure if you want to study acting as a career in college (because, let's face it, it’s nearly impossible to become famous in that industry), you can use those skill sets to study broader communications in college. People who like to act often are outgoing, enjoy the arts, are good at public speaking, and are articulate. Many broadcast journalists started out as actors and theater lovers and even performed in their school's choirs.

Because theater people are typically outgoing and energetic, being a reporter would be a good fit as the job requires talking to strangers and communicating well in front of many people — like on television!

Choosing a career that is influenced by your hobbies can make for a fulfilling lifestyle. It is so important to be happy in your job because it is what you will be doing every day after graduating college, so put your happiness first.

Examine your strengths: What are you good at? 

Evaluate your strengths and skills, considering both your “soft” and “hard” skills. If you haven’t heard of these terms before, “soft” skills include the ability to communicate effectively, lead a team, and problem-solve. Let’s take a look at some real-world examples that involve soft skills.

• Ever been assigned to a group project in history or science class at school? If so, you’ve probably had to work with classmates who aren’t necessarily your friends or who don’t split up the group work equally. However, if you have good soft skills, you will know how to communicate effectively with your groupmates to succeed in the team project. You’ll often facilitate the group meetings and lead the group to success -- after all, in any team project, there is always someone who assumes the position of the team leader, and that could be you!
• If you work a part-time job after school, you’ll need to use your soft communication skills to speak with your manager about any questions and issues you might encounter. Learning how to speak with adults in a professional, mature way is an important skill to carry with you to college and beyond.

Some potential careers that use soft skills are in communications, project management, event planning, sales, and counseling.

Conversely, “hard” skills are technical abilities specific to certain professions. Examples include:

• Maybe you’re a math whiz who loves competing on your school's math team. Strengthening your mathematics skills can set you up for a career working with numbers.
• Are you creative but into more of the technical side? Take film-making, for example. Maybe you love to watch movies -- maybe even create films yourself -- but are interested in audio engineering or the video editing side. Becoming proficient in certain software, whether it's Python for coding or Adobe Premiere/Adobe Audition for video editing, these technical skills can set you up for success in specific skill-based jobs.

Different skill-based jobs include software engineer, video editor, web developer, data analyst, and data entry clerk.

In the end, a good college candidate will have learned both soft and hard skills. Working on both makes you a better job candidate and a more well-rounded person.

Sign up for a summer career program

Career exploration programs can be a great way to help high schoolers figure out what job they might want in the future and what major to pick in college.

Typically, your school will offer different programs for students to enroll in during the summer, but sometimes, your local community or other online resources have these opportunities for you. If you don’t have time to enroll in a full program, there are tons of excellent websites that can help narrow down what careers might be good for you based on a survey and your skills.

So, what is a college career exploration program? These programs are designed to prep students for their careers post-high school.

Depending on what high school you attend, your school may already implement a program intended for all students to use to help them navigate their careers. For example, you might be familiar with Naviance, a career and life readiness platform, with nearly 7 million students using the website at nearly 8,500 schools in 100 countries.

High school guidance counselors also have access to their own Naviance account to send recommendation letters and transcripts to colleges that a student might put on their list. The website also allows students to research colleges and see where they would fall under admissions based on their own test scores.

Naviance offers:

• Self-discovery tools and surveys to help students determine their strengths and career interests
• Career planning tool to help students look for different career options
• Course planning tools
• Interactive lessons so students can develop critical hard and soft skills

There are many websites that can assist you in your career exploration journey, but the first step is to see what prep courses and programs your high school offers.

Don’t stress, and keep an open mind!

Not knowing what you want to do for the rest of your life is scary yet normal. I bet if you ask any adult in your life if they knew exactly what they wanted to be as high schoolers, they would say “no.” Your junior year of high school can especially be stressful with college applications around the corner -- but you don’t have to go through it alone! We know it can feel like a lot of pressure to decide what you want to be for the rest of your life while preparing to apply to colleges, but it’s important to keep calm during these years.

Take the time to explore and keep an open mind about potential majors and careers throughout your four short years in high school -- it goes by fast. Most adults switch majors and jobs often throughout their lives, so don’t feel like you only have one chance to make the “right decision.”

Stay open to exploring different career paths because this is the time in your life to do so! Connect with mentors — whether that be teachers, family friends, or professionals — who can help guide you and offer career advice.