Educational and Vocational Guidance and the Context of the Personal Project of High School Students

Abstract

Building a mature professional project in a world where change is a lived reality presents a significant challenge. Faced with the constant updating of education programs to align with the fast-paced and unpredictable job market, a high school student reveals a genuine need for assistance in developing a suitable career choice. Given the necessity for efficient guidance, multiple stakeholders come into play: families and close persons, peers, educational institutions, and career advisors. This study aims to develop career guidance for learners to empower them to interpret their environment and discover and control their resources. We conducted a survey involving seventy-five high school students to investigate the development of students’ projects as they engage with two crucial institutions in their lives: the family and the school, in addition to various information sources provided by the students. Our subsequent focus is on how these elements intersect with individual characteristics. Employing a quantitative approach, we conducted structured interviews to understand the influence of various stakeholders on the students’ project development. The analysis and interpretation of the obtained results underscore the paramount role of families in shaping the projects of two-thirds of the students in our sample while assigning limited influence on the educational institution and the school career guidance system. This study enabled us to uncover students’ professional preferences and identify the various sources of information deemed reliable when making career choices. Keywords: context, high school student, career guidance, personal project, sources of information. https://doi.org/10.55463/issn.1674-2974.50.9.10