Career and Academic Forums: A Model to Connect the College Experience to Future Career Options
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.55420/2693.9193.v9.n1.263Keywords:
community college students, United States jobs, academic support servicesAbstract
Many students enter community college with unclear goals or little sense of how to link academic and career plans. We aimed to guide students’ decisions about careers by providing career forums in the health, STEM and business fields where professionals spoke about their academic and career paths and follow-up academic forums where staff provided information about their department’s services at Bronx Community College (BCC). In total, 163 students attended the health career forum and 205 students attend the STEM and business career forum. A majority of students who completed the post surveys reported the career forums were extremely or very helpful to their future academic plans and most reported they felt very much or somewhat more knowledgeable about their career path after attending the event. Almost half (49%) of those who completed the post survey for the heath career forum indicated they would consider an alternative career path. Most students reported the academic forums were helpful to their future academic plans. These results suggest that hosting career and academic forums may help students identify and enter programs of study that are appropriate for their goals and interests early in their academic career thereby helping to improve completion and retention rates.
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