Training

Plans for the future.

A counsellor’s role is to facilitate transition from school to work and to help pupils to create a pathway to a meaningful, satisfying employment. There are several transition routs from school to work:
primary → secondary → tertiary level ( college, university) → employment
primary → vocational or apprenticeship training → employment
primary → secondary →unstructured work experience combined with training → employment
primary → secondary →no training or education → employment
other combination of formal and informal education, training and work experience → employment

Career vision clarification can become an essential factor and motivator for the further steps after high school. Pupils should be encouraged to envision their career as well as to set up realistic career goals and make plans how to reach them.

To do this work properly, a pupil has to go through self-assessment, identification of personal values, interests, abilities, and career exploration stages. Some of them can perfectly do it themselves while others need a great assistance that should be provided by teachers and counsellors at school.

Complex interdependencies between the labour market, young people’s occupational choices, and career routes have been a focus of policy concern, discussions and research across European countries. VET, as a pathway for young people to a career, has been and continues to be open to wide interpretation and debate. The situation in most European countries is being characterised by a lack of parity of esteem, which relates to the perceptions of VET systems as the second-best choice, compared to academic routes. Enhancing the status and profile of the VET system is therefore a concern that has received much recognition in literature and policy papers on both national and European levels.

One of the key policy issues in advanced economies is the ease with which young people are able to make the transition from school to work. Youth unemployment for those unable to make the transition is one side of the problem, entailing substantial social and economic costs for individuals and society. However, even if young workers do find a job after finishing school, it may not have the characteristics they require. This may result in unmotivated and disengaged workers, as well as a skill mismatch that can lead individuals to multiple changes of employer and occupation. Advocates of vocational education emphasise its merits in speeding up the transition from education to work by providing early and effective matches for secondary education graduates. Dual systems, such as those in Austria, Germany and Switzerland, are believed to provide better matching of training to labour market demand (Ryan, 2001, Steedman, 2005).

Online Resources

• Career counselling and Job centreCollection of career resources – videos and articles is designed to help students through the career decision making process and transition from school to work.
• The choice book after high schoolThe book provides information on how to plan education path after high school
• Individualized Education Program. Post Secondary Transition Plan A template of an individualized postsecondary transition plan.