Extended Family Leadership Academy Helps Students Explore the Qualities of Their Dream Job
What do you want to be when you grow up? It’s a fun question to ask a small child but can be a stressful question for some high school students to answer.
In Extended Family Leadership Academy, we explore career choices in the Lesson, “The Qualities of Your Dream Job.” Would you rather work inside or outside? With animals or people? Daytime or nighttime? For a small company or large corporation? The list goes on and the students begin to consider their options. As they develop their lists, it becomes easier to think about jobs that match their ideal working situations.
When we have collected the “qualities of your dream job” list from each student in the group – the Extended Family Leadership Academy (EFLA) leaders study the lists and begin to search for community leaders whose careers match the students’ chosen qualities. We then invite those community leaders to attend our EFLA groups as guest presenters. Our presenters talk about how they chose their career and why, the steps they took to get to where they are in their chosen field, and any life lessons they learned along the way.
In addition to learning concrete steps to reaching their goals, EFLA students make important connections with local experts in their field of interest who can later serve as mentors, references for college or job applications, and future employers.
One great example of this involves a tenth-grade student who wanted to pursue a career in writing. We invited the editor of our local newspaper to speak. After his presentation, he was introduced to the student and offered her a monthly column, for pay! This tenth-grade girl was able to become a paid, monthly columnist in the newspaper and could begin to build her portfolio for her career all because of a connection she made in her EFLA group.
The Extended Family Leadership Academy is designed to help students successfully complete high school and move into the college program or career field of their choice.
Our group is open to any student who needs any extra information and encouragement to follow their dreams. Students learn about their dream jobs and get useful information in job interviews, health (including healthy relationships), and communication.
EFLA groups meet once a week during the school day for 18 weeks.
We are always looking for volunteer guest presenters! If you have room in your heart and time in your schedule to talk to kids about your career, we would love to hear from you!
Contact our EFLA Coordinator by email, Leslie@extendedfamilyhelp.org.
