LIFT Network Career Exploration

Career Exploration may be defined as the process of engaging a learner in researching, evaluating, and investigating modern career opportunities for the purposes of supporting said learner’s identification of a career pathway. Career exploration occurs in many spaces whether the setting is academic or not and may relate to an individual learner at any stage of their career span, whether the learner is pre, mid, or a late-career individual. The LIFT Network is investing in resources to improve systems level delivery of career exploration models – that support the quality of career advising support provided by educators, advisors, and/or career coaches within regional K-12 and adult education environments.

As observed in the 2018 Career Coaching and Navigation Report, commissioned by the Indiana Governor’s Workforce Cabinet, “Students must be systematically exposed to a full range of potential career opportunities through well-coordinated exploration activities that include regular visits by area employers, workplace tours, career interest inventories and classroom instruction that incorporates career focused topics and concepts to connect what they are learning to activities outside the classroom.”