Pathways



There are hundreds of career options out there. How do you make a career choice when you don't really know what you want to do? For some people, choosing their career comes naturally as their interests and talents are obvious. For others their talents are more 'hidden', and it is a matter of delving a little deeper to get a better understanding of the careers that they should consider.

Todays students are in many ways lucky. They have easily available to them, thanks to the internet, hundreds of quizzes, tools and questionaires specifically developed to help them choose a career path. They also have many agencies and individuals that they can turn to for help. The biggest problem for most students is that there are far too many different careers to choose from.

Subject Choices Subject choices can be a paritcularly difficult decision for those students who have no idea what they would like to do after finishing secondary school. Students are guided by the Pathways Team as to what subjects would best meet thier needs. The Career Services website also has a section specifically for students to help with their subject choices. I encourage those of you thinking about your subjects to check it out, just click on the following link. []

**Career Choices**
There are so many different jobs/careers out there that often students have no idea where to start. Once again the Career Services website is a good place to look. The following links will take you directly some interactive tools that can help.

CareerQuest []

Subject Matcher []

Jobs By Interest []

Skill Matcher []

Another really useful resource is the Just The Job TV Series. This series features students from secondary schools around the country finding out about a career and investigating whether it could be 'just the job' for them. The following PDF is a list of all the careers that heve been featured including details on which series, disc and episode you can find each career.



After you have chosen a Career to have a look at then you can watch it at TVNZ Ondemand by clicking on the following link. []

NCEA/Qualifications
It is important for students to know what qualifications they will need to gain at school in order for them get where they want to go. To find out about particular jobs, including qualifications required you can follow this link [] and then select a job from the list. This will also give you information like what working conditions are generally like, how many hours a week you can expect to work and what you can expect to earn.

Our school wiki also has a section that covers NCEA and details what is required to gain level 1, 2 and 3 certificates. http://massec.wikispaces.com/NCEA These requirements can also be found on the NZQA website where you can also find out what is needed to gain University Entrance.

What if you don't know what you want to do so don't know what qualifications you need? Don't Stress, the best thing is for you to try and keep your options open. Work to the best of your ability and gain the highest qualifications you are capable of. When you do decide on a career, don't panic if you realise you haven't quite got all the qualifications you need, there is always more than one path you can take. Come and have a chat in the Pathways room and together we can work out your options.

//Keep watching out for updates to the Pathways Wiki, more will be posted shortly.// //Here are some other links that you may find useful.//

**The Forces**
**[]** **[]** **[]** **[]** How well do you know your child’s career plans? [] Where are you at with your career plans? [] CV 4 Me [] SEEK – CV’s and Cover Letters [] Studylink [|http://www.studylink.govt.nz] Student Job Search [|http://www.sjs.co.nz]



STAR stands for Secondary Tertiary Alignment Resource. It is an important grant given to secondary schools where it is used to meet identified learning needs of senior students that cannot be catered for in the traditional school curriculum.

At Mangakahia we use STAR funding in the following ways,
 * helping to get students into the workforce, particularly those who are likely to leave school without any formal qualifications.
 * providing funding for tertiary type courses which will better meet students needs, provide motivation and facilitate a smooth transition to further education or employment.
 * support students to explore different career pathways and help them to make informed decisions about their schooling and future careers



Each year funding is available from the Tertiary Education Commission through the Gateway Programme. The Gateway programme is available to year 11,12 and 13 students to strengthen their pathway from school to workplace learning.

Students can undertake workplace learning across a range of industries and businesses while continuing to study at school. There are certain criteria students need to meet in order to be involved in the Gateway Programme the major one being the students attitude.

The Gateway programme works as follows,
 * Suitable students are identified through Careers Interviews
 * An individualised learning plan is prepared with each student, which identifies their needs
 * A workplacement relevant to the student's learning learning and vocational goals is arranged
 * Students carry out work placement and complete units of work
 * Credits gained are added to each students NZQA record of learning.