CREATING YOUR CAREER GOALS INTRODUCTION TO CAREER CLUSTERS Instructor PowerPoint 1 Copyright © 2009, Thinking Media, a division of SAI Interactive, Inc. All rights reserved. The Career Ready 101 logo is a registered trademark and Career Ready 101 is a trademark of SAI Interactive, Inc.

Introduction to Career Clusters Have you ever heard someone say they want to work in Health Care and wondered exactly what they mean? Do they want to become a doctor or a nurse? Do they want to be a hospital administrator or work in a medical research lab? Are they interested in maintaining and repairing biomedical equipment or becoming a medical librarian? 2

Introduction to Career Clusters The field of health care includes a broad and diverse set of occupations. If all of these careers are related to health care, how are they alike and how do they differ? 3

Introduction to Career Clusters All of these jobs are part of a career cluster. Career clusters provide a way to examine occupations related to broad career areas. This introduction lesson will: 4 Define what career clusters are, Describe how each cluster includes different career pathways, Show how career clusters and pathways can help you be better prepared for an eventual career and Show a listing of the 16 career clusters.

What are Career Clusters? Career clusters are a tool for: 5 grouping together careers and specific occupations that are related to broad industry classifications helping educators and industry representatives to define career pathways identifying the knowledge, skills and abilities people need to be successful in a cluster.

What are Career Clusters? Career clusters help: 6 ensure that what you learn in school is relevant to a career interest and to prepare you for success in college and the workplace.

What are Career Clusters? The traditional approach to preparing for a career: 7 get the training and education you need for a specific job. For example, you could spend one or two years training to be a surgical technologist, assisting doctors and nurses in surgery.

What are Career Clusters? Some experts predict that robots will soon perform tasks now done by surgical staff. 8 What could you do if your job became obsolete? Would you have to start all over in a new career?

What are Career Clusters? No! Within a career cluster, skills learned for one occupation may be transferable to another related occupation. Occupations and careers will change, and workers will need to adapt to those changes. Understanding what the knowledge and skills are for your occupation can help you make smarter career changes. 9

What are Career Clusters? For example, a surgical technician shares a good deal of knowledge and skills with other occupations in the Health Science career cluster. A surgical technician could train more quickly for a medical lab technician job than she could for a business management job. 10

16 Career Clusters The U.S. Department of Education established 16 career clusters that encompass all career occupations. Each cluster includes: 11 A list of sample career specialties and occupations, A description of different career pathways related to the cluster and Categories of knowledge and skills common to all occupations in the cluster.

The 16 Career Clusters 1.Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources 2.Architecture and Construction 3.Arts, Audio-Video Technology and Communications 4.Business, Management and Administration 5.Education and Training 6.Finance 7.Government and Public Administration 8.Health Science 12 9.Hospitality and Tourism 10.Human Services 11.Information Technology 12.Law, Public Safety, Corrections and Security 13.Manufacturing 14.Marketing, Sales and Service 15.Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics 16.Transportation, Distribution and Logistics

Career Pathways Occupations in each career cluster are grouped in two or more career pathways. Career pathway: a subset of occupations within a cluster that are related to each other by knowledge and skills they have in common. 13

Career Pathways Changing occupations between career pathways is easier than between career clusters. The knowledge and skills needed for one career are similar to those for a new occupation in that pathway. 14

Career Pathways Example: a Legal Assistant’s knowledge and skills are more similar to a Detective than to a Physical Therapy Assistant. They are in the same cluster - Law, Public Safety and Security – but different pathways. Both need knowledge of law and legal procedures. A PTA must know anatomy, physiology, and medical procedures. It is more difficult to move from Legal Asst. to a PTA job than to a career as a Detective. 15

Introduction Summary In this introductory lesson we learned: 16 Career clusters are groups of occupations that are related to an industry. The 16 career clusters represent all careers. Each cluster contains two or more career pathways. A career pathway is a subset of occupations in a cluster that have common skills and knowledge. Changing careers within a career pathway is easier since the skills you need in one occupation are related to others in the pathway.

Career Clusters: Next Steps We will learn more about each of the 16 career clusters in the next lessons. 17 You will also take a Career Cluster interest survey to find out which career clusters you may be most interested having a career in.

CREATING YOUR CAREER GOALS INTRODUCTION TO CAREER CLUSTERS END OF LESSON 18