Hundreds of LCPS high school students like Alexis Laws, a ninth grader at North Lenoir High, will log on to the MajorClarity career planning platform on Nov. 4 to explore occupations, learn about what schooling is required and engage in digital activities that provide detailed information about those jobs. Submitted phot.

Hundreds of high school students in Lenoir County are about to embark on a virtual voyage of discovery designed to help them map a course through academic success to a fulfilling career.

On Nov. 4, designated by LCPS as MajorClarity Day, all students at Kinston, North Lenoir and South Lenoir high schools will log on to the digital career planning platform to explore occupations that interest them and that match up to personality traits revealed in a widely-used assessment.

The aim is to help students develop a more detailed concept of career choices, using videos and other resources on the MajorClarity platform to learn about the intricacies of different jobs and what they need to do academically to get into those positions

“The students are going to get their Holland Career Code by doing the personality assessment, they’re going to find their learning style, they’re going to explore careers and through that they’ll be watching interviews of professionals in that career and they’ll be trying activities that a person in that career does on a daily basis,” said Brittany Harrison, LCPS’s career development coordinator and organizer of MajorClarity Day.

“What is unique about MajorClarity is that it offers engaging career simulation content, called career path ‘test-drives,’ that promote long-term comprehension and retention – and thus impact. Children only retain about 10 percent of what they read, while they can retain up to 95 percent of visual/interactive content,” the company reports in a news release.

Before Alexis Laws test drove the MajorClarity app recently, she had an idea she wanted to work in health care. After the North Lenoir High School ninth grader took the personality assessment – she has a strong bent toward the investigative – and used the apps other features, she sharpened her focus.

“I’ve always wanted to be in the medical field, and so I looked up a bunch of careers in the medical field and dermatology is kind of investigative because you have to figure out skin types and treatments, so that helped me figure out what kind of career I would like,” said Alexis, whose mother is a home-health nurse and whose father works in IT.

The personality assessment showed she has an artistic side that surprised her a little and encouraged her to check into other career fields, but the information ultimately didn’t sway her. “I knew that I wanted to work in the medical field and help people,” she said.

At North Lenoir, a high school known for its health-science program, she’s enrolled this semester in one of the program’s honors courses, Foundations of Health Science, and plans to use her career interests to shape her course of study. The clearer students are on their goals after graduation – whether entering the military or workforce or going to a two-year or four-year college – the more help they can get from school counselors, according to Harrison.

“On the backend of MajorClarity, the counselors are able to see what careers students are interested in, make sure they’re on the right pathway, see what colleges they’re interested in. It helps us provide students with what they need to move forward,” Harrison said.

LCPS has used MajorClarity as a tool of its career counseling program in the past, but never before has the school district made the kind of “major push” coming Nov. 4, according to Harrison. Middle school students will use MajorClarity to refine career interests this fall, with a special emphasis on defining eighth graders’ academic needs as they prepare to enter high school.

“Every student has an academic career plan,” she said. “It helps us to have one central online platform that we can go into and see what students’ interests are. When we meet with the students, we want to help them make sure they’re on the right track with their high school courses or college courses.”

Whatever grade students are in or whenever they engage with MajorClarity, fellow student Alexis Laws has this advice: “Answer the questions honestly because that will give you more accurate results. Really consider all the different careers that they say you match with and research them and do the activities.”

Parents can learn more about MajorClarity by watching this video. https://tinyurl.com/yxrwn2yj