CareerSmart Classrooms

What This Includes

Skills addressed: Innovation, Information Technology, Diversity, Leadership, Professional Mindset, Lifelong Learning, Problem Solving, Oral Communication, Teamwork, Leadership

Learner resources

• Self-assessment of interests and strengths
• Career exploration resources to research careers and create an education and career plan
• Career Focus Kits, with in-depth information about specific occupations within career clusters
• Employability class activities to learn about workplace and college success skills

Instructor resources

• Career Focus Kits cover thirty career clusters aligned to popular U.S. pathways, such as healthcare, sports, and transportation, with information for each job category, including job responsibilities, a video profile, sample job titles, education level required, wage and job growth projections, and the O*Net and Holland Interest Codes
• Career exploration resources include lesson plans for self-assessments with Holland code and O*Net handouts
• Employability skills lesson plans and activities to build workplace and college success
• Think Tank professional learning activities for staff to build constructive dialogue and peer-to-peer learning around career readiness

Key Takeaways

• The Adult Education Career Focus Kit focuses on careers that do not require a bachelor’s degree in fields such as healthcare, law and public safety, restaurant and hospitality, although learners have access to all of the kits if they want to pursue a job requiring a higher education degree.
• The employability curriculum includes a factory floor role-play to highlight the need for teamwork, communication, and other workplace success skills.
• Learners use a soft skills scorecard to measure their progress.
• The resources in this system are contextualized for middle school and high school teachers, postsecondary faculty, and adult education program instructors, with terminology and vocabulary appropriate for each group.
• Think Tank activities for small groups of teachers and/or students help build dialogue amongst colleagues and with students and employers about college and career readiness.

Tags: Communication, Critical & Creative Thinking, Digital Literacy, Leadership & Initiative, Respecting Differences, Self-Management, Teamwork & Collaboration, Assessment Tool, Instructional Material, Download & Print, Online, Paid Subscription, Adult Education, Higher Education, Older Youth