freshman transition program planning tool

Step 4

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What makes Career Choices unique in dropout prevention efforts?

We all know the saying, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink, and the same holds true for students: you can sit kids in the classroom but you can't make them think. So the challenge all educators face is finding a way to transform the unmotivated students into motivated, self-directed learners—because without intrinsic motivation on the part of the student, you'll struggle with all your high school reform efforts.

In life, attitude is everything. You accomplish what you think you can accomplish. If you think you can, you will; if you think you can't, you won't. This couldn't be truer when dealing with early adolescents. Career Choices addresses this by changing students’ attitudes about learning. It gives students a reason to learn by leading them through a carefully developed process of nearly 100 activities and exercises that help each student author their own vision of an attainable future.

If you change their attitudes, you'll change their lives.
When students value education, they won't dropout.

Why does it Work?

So how does Career Choices help the individual value education? It's done through a carefully constructed scope- and-sequence curriculum that leads the student through a series of activities, group discussions and self-reflection exercises that answer the most important questions of the adolescent (i.e., Eric Erickson's Identity Formation):

Who Am I, What Do I Want and How Do I Get It?

The rigorous Career Choices coursework culminates with the development of a quantitative
10-year educational and career plan. Without a comprehensive guidance course with the depth of content provided by Career Choices, the average 13- or 14-year old would not be able to write a meaningful 10-year plan.

Unlike the software and online programs that “magically” help students choose careers, majors, colleges, etc. through a series of vague surveys, this course relies on the innate wisdom of the individual to reason and to choose. For the adolescent, the process of becoming identity-achieved takes study, discussion, feedback, support and personal observations. You don’t want to short circuit this important developmental step. The young person who truly knows themselves and their own motivations will be much more likely to have the self-esteem needed to stay the course, even under adverse situations.

Career Choices exposes the learner to the process of career and life decision-making, thereby empowering them with the confidence that they can make the best choices for themselves. This skill set is critical in our world of constant change where at work adults face outsourcing, off shoring, displacement, downsizing and, in their personal lives, disability, divorce or death of a spouse.

Personalization: Connecting teachers and students with the optional
My10yearPlan.com

Students’ 10-year plans, the culmination of their Career Choices course work, will serve as a road map for the life that will embody their own goals, hopes and dreams. Produced in a quantitative form (written personal goals and objectives, budget projections, educational plans, lifestyle options taken from the Workbook/Portfolio), this dynamic document can also be shared online with all instructors throughout the school with the use of the optional www.My10yearPlan.com. This tool is the gold standard of personalization and comprehensive guidance in the classroom.

Just think, every teacher can become an advisor for every student in each of his or her classes. This online advisory option connects your students to every teacher they work with during their four years in high school in a way never before thought possible. If your school chooses to use this enhancement, you also have the option of initiating a school-wide initiative as described in the NASSP magazine article read in Step One. By infusing the concept of the 10-year plan into the whole school culture, you'll constantly reinforce the messages critical to dropout prevention, including answering the question, “What’s in it for me?”

Career Choices greatest accomplishment is that it helps all students—high achievers and struggling learners alike—begin to project into the future and understand the consequences of today’s actions and choices. Once they embrace this in the personalized way Career Choices facilitates, you'll have their attention, energy and focus. Initiate a Career Choices course in your school and you'll never hear your students say, “If only someone had told me what it was going to be like when I was growing up.”

For more details about Career Choices curriculum and what it can do for your school to reduce your dropout rates you’ll want to watch (and share) these online training modules:

	Stories about schools with successful freshman programs
	FAQ - the answers to your questions that will help you develop your proposal
	What if your school structure will currently not accommodate a separate Freshman Transition course?

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