Many students headed for college have never had to deal with long-term goals. You provide them with a roof over their heads, a bed to sleep in, clothes to wear, and food on the table. They barely have to set short-term goals, much less those that take time and concentrated effort to accomplish. So when they leave home to pursue a college degree, they might not have the first idea how to go about creating and reaching goals that will take longer than a semester to complete. And this short-sighted attitude could make for some very serious problems.
Take a major, for example. Although students spend the majority of their freshman and sophomore years finishing general education credits, most also begin taking prerequisite courses for their major. If your student hasn’t decided on a major, any additional classes they take during this time could end up being a waste (of time and money). But you can give your teens the tools they need to make a solid, long-term plan. Here are a few tips to get them on track for setting and reaching overarching goals.
The first thing you’ll want to do is sit down with your teens to talk about a 5- or 10-year plan. This might sound like a long time to your teens, and it is. Throughout their late teens and twenties, most people develop and change in a variety of ways, which can make it extremely difficult to lay out a long-term life plan. But you don’t necessarily have to start with a college major and a career, which are extremely finite goals. You can begin by discussing more general plans. For example, you might ask your teens what they’re interested in and what they enjoy. Do they like helping others, working in groups, or being responsible for only themselves? Are they concerned about the environment, the economy, human rights, gun control, or any other current issues? Do they want to have a home, children, and money for vacations or are they happy having no commitments to tie them down?
Believe it or not, the answers to these questions can help your college-bound students to narrow their focus and come up with a major that will help them to reach certain life goals, rather than those that are simply career-oriented. Knowing what we want from life can help us to determine the types of jobs that will lead to happiness and fulfillment on a personal level. From there you can start to discuss more targeted issues like a career, a major, schools and programs, and even specific coursework. You can talk about which clubs and activities are going to contribute to successes in a chosen field. You can look into growth in particular job markets, types of jobs available, and even the prospect of benefits like health insurance and a retirement plan.
By starting with broad likes, interests, and desires you can begin to focus in on long-term professional goals. And when you make your teens consider their answers carefully, you are giving them the skills they need to objectively approach their goals in order to lay out a path to success on their own. Of course, they may still change their minds along the way, hopping from political science to arts and humanities to CNA certification training. Who knows how they will grow and change when they’re out on their own? But the hope is that they will eventually settle on something they love in order to enter a profession that is challenging and fulfilling, and that the process will teach them how to set and achieve long-term goals on their own.
