The Career Information Center is open from 7:00 am to 3:30 pm Monday through Friday during the school year and during the summer months the hours are limited to a few days a week. Our goal is to find the right job or career for students and what they need to get that job or career through research, testing, and guide books.

Step 1. What are your plans for the future?

Career preparation testing; In the Career Information Center, they administer and interpret several different assessment tests to find a suitable career/job for students. One such test is the Career Scope. The Career Scope is a test that combines a student's interests with their aptitude to come up with a compatible job or jobs that the student will enjoy and be good at. The test takes about 45 minutes to complete and students can have the printed results within a few minutes. Besides giving the student a list of correlating jobs, the Career Scope also tells how much education is needed for particular jobs and if any special vocational classes are needed. This enables students to select classes for the following year that will help them succeed in their career choice.

Step 2. Research: choosing the right career.

The Career Information Center has over a 1000 jobs on file in their Chronicle Occupational Guide. The guides give a description of a particular job, what kind of education it might take for that job, a salary range and helpful websites to do more research if needed. The Career Information Center has a program that will allow you to look up a career by the career title, career cluster, career pathway, and /or keyword.  There are hundreds of different careers to look over, research and print.

There is a selection of books that sort careers by personality traits. For instance, one book has careers for "Good Samaritans & Other Humanitarian Types". Students who desire to help those less fortunate can find an array of jobs and what qualifications they need to get the job. The book also lists places where people work at particular jobs, like "Hospice" and "Project HOPE". There is a video library composed of several video's with a variety of jobs on them. Each tape is divided into career pathways that give students a chance to see alternate jobs in their pathway that they might not have known about. Each tape is approximately a half hour in length and shows between 6 and 10 different jobs. Students can also access the M.O.I.S. (MI Occupational Information System) program on any of the computers in the Career Information Center. Students can use M.O.I.S. to research a variety of careers and find colleges and universities that offer degrees in that particular career. M.O.I.S. offers a self assessment test designed to narrow your choice of careers, a decision making program that offers worksheets to help make your final decision on a career, and an exploration program to find out information on a career in the M.O.I.S. data base.

Come in and look what is new for the 2007-08 school year!  A software program called Career Cruising.  Career Cruising has been designed with one goal in mind:  to help students plan their future.  With exceptional assessment tools, detailed occupation profiles, and comprehensive post-secondary education information, students move seamlessly through the career exploration and planning process.  At the same time, you have access to real-time information and statistics you need to track your students' progress and achievement.  This software is fun, easy-to-use, and powerful. 

Step 3. Education and Training

Once you've selected a career or job and you've researched it, you need to find out what it takes to get that job. The Career Information Center has information on colleges and universities throughout Michigan and from at least one college or university in every state. Once a student has decided which school to go to, the Career Information Center can help them get all the necessary paper work in order. There are financial aid forms, scholarship applications, college applications, course descriptions and requirements, tuition costs, and college catalogs.  The Career Information Center contains numerous college videos and C.D.s to get a close up view of campus life. If college isn't the right path for you, there is also information on a variety of trade schools. There is information on tuition and certificates offered on such schools as the American Truck Driving School and The Floral Design Academy. For students interested in the Military, there are books, flyers, magazines, and recruiters available to assist you. The recruiters come in monthly and the Career Information Center can help any student visit with someone from any of the Military branches.

Step 4. Finding Employment

Time to get a job? Either to help pay for college or for something long term, the Career Information Center can help. There are dozens of books on how to write the perfect resume, cover letter and filling out applications. The Career Information Center can assist students with information on locating potential employers, how to act during an interview, what employers are looking for and how to keep a job once you've gotten one. Students are able to design their resume right here in the Career Information Center and can print them on professional resume paper. Once they have their resume, help can be provided for them to find out what jobs are available depending on what they want to do and where they want to work. The Career Information Center utilizes the Michigan Works job bank and other helpful websites to find job openings and is located right next to our Job Placement Coordinator, which can be very beneficial for students looking for immediate employment.  The Career Informtion Center has a bulletin board where you can find part-time and health related positions posted daily. 

Revised:  11/19/07