The NYSED/CUNY CareerKits were created in response to the need for materials that teachers and counselors can use to help students learn about careers, while not taking time away from the academic work that will help students reach their goals.
What are The NYSED/CUNY CareerKits?
They are a library of lessons that ESOL and literacy programs can use with students to introduce them to individual careers and career sectors, including what people in various jobs do, what are related, higher and lower level jobs, and how people become trained and credentialed to get those jobs. While activities use one or more jobs as sample careers to explore, the focus is on helping students develop the research skills that will help them learn about any career (or any other topic!), by developing questions, searching for information, reading, interpreting and synthesizing information.
The CareerKits are twofers.
We know that teachers and counselors barely have enough time with students as it is. Because of that, we designed CareerKit activities to satisfy two goals at the same time – career exploration and literacy, language or numeracy practice.
- Career Exploration — Students learn about individual careers, for example, in the Healthcare sector, what is the difference between an Ambulance Driver, an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) and a Paramedic? How much does each one earn? What do they do at work? How can I become one? How can I move from one to another? If I start as a Home Health Aide, without a diploma or much experience, how can I move into a better position, earning more money with less physically straining work?
- Language, Literacy and Numeracy Practice — Many of the skills already practiced in the classroom are in the CareerKits — readings and constructed response, analysis of graphs, computation, essay-writing, vocabulary development, and social studies content.
While career exploration is sometimes separated from “regular” academic work in language and literacy classes, why should it be? We believe there are ways to do both at once. So we created materials that are academic while at the same time use career exploration as their content.
In the activity below, students use CareerZone, a career database, to research careers. While learning about Ambulance Drivers, they practice website navigation, using keyword searches, citing sources, reading for content, summarizing, paraphrasing and making inferences.
The CareerKits are based in labor data and industry experts.
Each CareerKit uses data from the NYC Labor Market Information Service so that students not only refine their interests and goals based on in-depth knowledge about careers, but also learn about the current labor market. Which sectors are expanding? Which careers in those sectors have openings? What are the most common pathways people take when progressing within a sector?
Data doesn’t always capture a complete picture. In addition to consulting the numbers, we have consulted with dozens of industry advisors who tell us what it’s really like in the field. What do they look for in new hires? What makes them promote someone? What are the most reputable training programs?
What does a CareerKit contain?
There are 11 CareerKits in total. Career Fundamentals is a broad overview to career exploration in general. There are 10 sector-based CareerKits in Healthcare, Technology, Community & Social Services, Education & Childcare, Manufacturing, Food Production, Retail, Transportation & Warehousing, Construction and Hospitality, Recreation & the Arts.
Each CareerKit contains a Skills Chart where users can search a table of contents according to academic skill, for example, activities that use bar graphs or essay-writing or the law of supply and demand.
PDFs of all completed CareerKits are available online here. More will be added as they become available.
Written at the HSE and upper ESL level, CareerKit activities can be adapted for lower levels, by modifying readings or scaffolding activities, for example. To modify activities, users can contact ellen.baxt@cuny.edu to receive Microsoft Word version of the student materials.
