Career Research
To make the wisest career choice: Know yourself well. Then:
- Research career fields of interest.
- Identify coursework, skills, and experience you will need to be competitive in your career.
- Acquire coursework, skills, and experience you need to be competitive.
- Learn how to market your knowledge, skills, experience, and potential.
The Career Services staff is here to help you through each of these steps.
Below are a few websites that have helpful information on researching different career choices:
Occupational Outlook Handbook (OOH), 2010-11 Edition: The U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook is a nationally recognized source of career information, designed to provide valuable assistance to individuals making decisions about their future work lives. The Handbook is revised every two years.
O*NET OnLine: The O*NET program is the nation's primary source of occupational information. Central to the project is the O*NET database, containing information on hundreds of standardized and occupation-specific descriptors. The database is continually updated by surveying a broad range of workers from each occupation. Information from this freely available database forms the heart of O*NET OnLine, the interactive application for exploring and searching occupations. The database also provides the basis for our Career Exploration Tools, a set of valuable assessment instruments for workers and students looking to find or change careers.
CollegeGrad.com: Understanding different careers is critical to job search success. Know what you want to do before searching for it. This career information is drawn from data provided by the U.S. Department of Labor, the most comprehensive resource for occupational and career information available on the Internet.
Career Overview: Making informed career decisions can be a daunting and sometime near impossible task. CareerOverview.com is a non-commercial website dedicated to providing aspiring career professionals and students with relevant, reliable and up-to-date career and job information whereby helping them to make better, more informed career choices.
VAULT career information center has a wide array of on-line career information guides regarding numerous topics including resumes, interviews and job search advice. Also available are organizational profiles for over 10,000 potential employers in over 180 industries and a searchable list of specific employment opportunities. To sign in: click on VAULT above and use your VMI username and password to sign in. For more information, see the Vault Users Guide.
SIGI 3: The SIGI 3 educational and career planning software integrates self-assessment and career information to help facilitate effective career decision making. This in-depth system is widely used by colleges and universities nationwide for work with students. Go to the SIGI 3 link and create your individual user name and password. For more information, please see the SIGI 3 Users Guide.
CTICareerSearch: The Careers tab of this website lists hundreds of employment categories, with nationwide summary employment data. For a detailed profile on any of the careers, you can click on the career name. Each career has its own profile page, including info on the profession in hundreds of local metropolitan areas. Most career pages also have photographs and even a video describing the career path.
Career Profiles For years CareerProfiles.info has been assisting aspiring career professionals, job seekers and students make better, more informed career choices by providing them with highly relevant, reliable and up-to-date career information and job search resources. With many thousands of daily visitors CareerProfiles.info is now one of the premier career and job search websites on the Internet.