A Comprehensive Experience
Crucial to the effectiveness of My10yearPlan.com is the completion of a Career Choices course. After all, getting the average 13-or 14-year-old to project into the future 10 years requires a comprehensive guidance experience.
HOW IT WORKS

Once students have completed the activities and exercises in their Workbook and Portfolio, they are ready to spend 2-3 hours entering the information they've collected about themselves into the fields required to build their 10-year plan online.

For a list of the completed student workbook pages that feed into the online plans, CLICK ARROW
Envisioning Your Future
Envisioning Your Future
Defining Success
Your Personal Profile
Components of Lifestyle
Budget for Your Lifestyle
Your Chart
Career Interest Survey
Making a Career Choice
Goal Setting
Career Alternative Ladder
Transferable Skills Chart
My Resume
Data for Job Applications & Interviews
Where is it You Want to Go?
Vertical Timeline
Your Plan
Your Mission Statement
Workbook
6
9
11
28
32-42
62
68-73
83
87
101
109
111
112
116-117
118
121-123
121-123
Career Choices
10-14
18-21
24-49
56-73
74-105
124-141
144-155
168-179
182-191
226-227
246
250-253
254-261
266-271
272-273
Ch 12
Ch 12
Instructor's Guide
10-14
4/10
4/15-4/30
4/37-4/45
4/47-4/69
4/79-4/84
4/85-4/91
4/107-4/115
4/117-4/121
4/139-4/140
4/150
4/152-4/154
4/155-4/158
4/161-4/164
4/164
4/166
4/167
What's IncludedIncluded in the online plan is the personal data and information necessary for developing a meaningful plan. This data is taken from 25 of the Workbook and Portfolio's 126 pages.

The program also includes a budget calculator, matching the exercise in Chapter 4 of Career Choices, that makes exploring a wide range of financial scenarios possible. This is particularly effective as students determine what kind of effort they want to put into their education and occupational preparation.

With the online worksheets filled out and saved, the web site carries the student's specific information to their own personal plan summary.
How to Use the Workbook & My10yearPlan.com® Together
How to Use the Workbook & My10yearPlan.com® Together

Even with the optional access to My10yearPlan.com®, secondary students will want to use both the Workbook and My10yearPlan.com® account for maximum benefit. Students might have access to computers in class every day, or maybe only in the computer lab time once or twice a week. The Workbook helps to make either situation work. Here’s how:

1. Students should always complete the activity in the Workbook first.

Just like most writing assignments, the work in Career Choices will go through a few different editorial stages. Think of the Career Choices Workbook and Portfolio as the place where students will create a draft for each activity, and think of My10yearPlan.com® as the place where they will review, edit, and polish their draft.

2. After students have completed the activity in the Workbook, they can login to My10yearPlan.com® and enter the information online. 

This can happen whenever students have access to a computer -- whether it’s during class time, after school in the library or career center, or at home during the evening.

3. Before just typing away, students should take a moment and read through the response written in their Workbook. 

Maybe students have given the activity some more thought since they completed it in class. They’ll want to ask “Does my answer still seem like the best possible response?” If so, they can ahead and enter it into My10yearPlan.com®. If not, they might want to update the answer as they type it in.

4. Either way, this is also a chance to pay attention to spelling, check for typos, and make sure they are answering in complete sentences when appropriate. 

Keep in mind that the information students input in the activity pages of My10yearPlan.com® will flow to the 10-year plan summary page and to portfolio pages that students will want to print and use for job interviews, scholarship interviews, and more. Students might also share these pages with an advisor, counselor, parent, or mentor, so this process gives students an opportunity to make sure they are always putting their best work into My10yearPlan.com®.
Advisory OptionsEvery instructor and administrator is then able to access the summary of each student's 10-year plan. Information that once would've been available after 20-30 minutes of reading through a student's completed Workbook and Portfolio is now available in seconds. Any instructor, counselor, or administrator with password-driven access can now gain a thorough understanding of a student's goals and ambitions by quickly retrieving their online plan and reviewing the summary. The accessibility of this information makes qualitative counseling and academic support easier to provide.
 For an example on how this advisory process might work CLICK ARROW
Suppose Marcus is failing algebra and his instructor, Mrs. Fernandez, asks Marcus to come by his classroom during lunch to discuss the situation. With only a few minutes to prepare for their meeting after excusing his last class before lunch, Mrs. Fernandez quickly pulls up Marcus’ 10-year plan online and discovers Marcus wants to be a high school history instructor and baseball coach. Knowing this, Mrs. Fernandez has the opportunity to point out to Marcus that, upon review of his goals and dreams, there is a problem if he doesn’t pass algebra, as it is required to get into college.

Pointing out the deficit, Mrs. Fernandez can suggest strategies for getting Marcus back on track with his algebra so that he can continue working toward his goal of playing baseball in college while earning a degree.

Understanding the Consequences
If Marcus resists, Mrs. Fernandez can suggest he rewrite his 10-year plan to redirect his aspirations to match his effort. Because Marcus has completed a Career Choices course, he will fully understand the consequences of that action and will be far more likely to buckle down and make the effort required to complete his academic coursework.
Updating Strategies
Finally, during the course of their sophomore, junior, and senior years, students have the opportunity to update and revise their online plans as they reassess their goals. We recommend that one academic department commit to taking responsibility each year for facilitating this process. Click here for examples of how to incorporate this into 10th-, 11th- and 12th-grade coursework.