Journal of Career Development

The article makes a case for the construction of narratives as major focus for career planning. Narratives can be seen as an appropriate compliment to the analysis of objective test data that has dominated our practice in the past. Narrative is described as an approach for career counselors to understand clients' vocational experiences and future plans. Subjective and objective aspects of a career narrative are explored, and emphasis is placed on co-authoring a career story that is subjectively meaningful and objectively sound. The client's subjective understanding of the career story is given importance as being pivotal information that must be considered in career counseling. Five key interventions are described from a narrative perspective.

The way in which the government defines "financial need" does not always account for the individual decisions families make when sending a student to college. Many students who do not qualify for federal financial aid must still pay for part of their educational expenses, and need a part-time job in order to do so. The Job Location and Development (JLD) program was designed to help these students find the employment they need, to pick up where federal work study leaves off. Since 1979, the MU Career Center and the Office of Student Financial Aid at the University of Missouri-Columbia have together operated a JLD program on campus that, since its inception, has helped more than 25,000 students find employment while in school. Those employment opportunities serve to not only assist students in funding their education, but also to provide students the opportunity to learn about themselves—their strengths and weaknesses, their career interests, perhaps what major they ought to choose—as well as valuable skills they can use after graduation.

In the last ten years, professional and popular literature focused on the relatedness of spirituality and career. The field of career guidance and development is beginning to integrate individuals' religious and spiritual beliefs. Likewise, it seems the Church would be a source of career assistance. This paper reviews professional literature, from 1960-early 2000s, regarding the role of the Church in the United States in career guidance and development. The focus is on vocational themes in relation to the Church, Church involvement in career guidance and development programs, and recommendations for the role of the Church in career guidance and development. The review concludes that over the past 40 years, the professional literature on this topic has declined. The Church has made grassroots efforts at providing career guidance, but only through improved communication of ideas and program results will the Church provide effective career programming on a larger scale.

In Fall 2002, the University of Missouri-Columbia began a new initiative to develop placement services for liberal arts students. Placement services had never before been offered to this student population and the MU Career Center was designated as the principal creator, administrator and provider of these career services. The Career Center staff decided the most effective approach would be to develop a strategic plan that reflected the needs, values, and desires of our faculty, student, and employer constituents. We conducted an environmental scan, collected substantial data and gathered campus feedback. After careful analysis, we developed a dynamic and responsive strategic plan that would meet our goals and achieve success with our financial, organizational, and human resources in mind.

This paper presents a four-stage model of career decision-making based on an existential theoretical perspective. Existential themes such as freedom, responsibility, meaning, and authenticity are examined for their applicability to career decision-making across the life span. The author submits that career satisfaction and stability is obtained when there is a correspondence between the vocation and the meaning and opportunities for authentic existence that the vocation provides. Failure to acquire opportunities for meaning and authentic existence in individual's occupations result in an existential vacuum and existential guilt, respectively. Conceptualization of career decision-making from an existential perspective may be particularly beneficial for individuals making mid-career changes. Case studies are provided to elucidate the stages of the model and to specify the career counseling interventions that are most relevant for the various stages. Research implications as well as limitations of this model are also discussed.

This action-oriented classroom career guidance activity introduces elementary school students to the need for workers to work together in operating a newly opened restaurant. Through the use of pantomime and role play, students quickly realize that running a restaurant requires a variety of employees who work well together as members of a team.