Why Didn't They Tell Me That In School?
By hvedra
@hvedra (1619)
October 15, 2010 11:09am CST
Why did our careers advisor not tell me I could be a Somellier?
I went to an inner city school which had a very fixed view of the career path of most of the pupils. Unless you were good at something technical and they could point you towards engineering or accountancy, they assumed you were going to be working in a supermarket or factory. If you were really lucky you might get an office job...
Because all we saw was those kind of jobs (and we thought office jobs were fancy) there was no effort to teach us about any other ways to make a living. University wasn't even mentioned. If you had ideas about being something like a journalist they pretty much laughed at you and sent you on work experience packing boxes.
Those of you with kids in school now, please tell me that has changed? Tell me that your kid has a wider knowledge of the world and if they wanted to do something they'd get some support. Please?
For those of you who are older, did you have supportive and helpful careers advisors or did they assume that because you had a particular socio-economic background your life was already mapped out?
1 person likes this
2 responses
@bestboy19 (5478)
• United States
20 Oct 10
The guidance counselor at my school thought I'd never be able to do anything beyond basket weaving. I retired at age 55, with a very nice pension, from an office job (no basket weaving involved). My brother-in-law was told by his guidance counselor that he'd amount to nothing. He owns his own business. Considering the poor assessment these two counselors made, I wouldn't put much stock in the opinions of advisers.
@writersedge (22563)
• United States
17 Oct 10
When I was a kid, they "tracked" kids in one of two directions. One was college where they asked you what you wanted to do(like you know, you're a kid!). The other was vocational where they asked you what you wanted of the courses at nearyby 2 year tech high school. No career education at all.
Things have changed a lot here. Now they tell you all about different jobs that might be out there. You take tests of interests and abilities. They combine them and show you 10 jobs that you might be good at. They encourage you to read about people who have combined their talents in interesting and unusual ways. Thins are way better here than they were.
I took an interest and ability test a few years ago when I couldn't get a teaching job. Forest ranger, guard, many careers with animals including small farmer and vet tech came up as well as anything with people like personal assistant. Teaching a classroom full of kids did not come up, does that tell you anything? Also assisting a lawyer came up (called a paralegal in this country). Basically, anything with animals or people where I could work one on one with people or animals. When I first was in college standing up in front of a bunch of people killed me. I had to get over that to teach. Onene on one tutoring, I loved and still love. But they had to cram that peg into that hole. You know?
