Higher Education Quality and Guidance: Efficacy of a Career Self-Management Seminar for Undergraduates

Abstract

Career services and interventions based on research and empirical evidence are progressively considered mechanisms for quality assurance in higher education. We present a study on the effectiveness of a career self-management seminar designed for help undergraduates prepare for next life career changes and goal attainment. Four hundred and twenty eight students with an age mean of 22 years old (n=208 experimental group; n=220 control group) attending university and polytechnic higher institutions in the northwestern Portugal, were assessed by the Career Exploration Survey, the Career Development Inventory and My Vocational Situation according to a pretest and posttest design. The Seminar is research based and comprises nine weekly small group sessions of 120 minutes each which facilitate students’ career planning, in-depth exploration, goal implementation and feedback competences. Results indicate significant differences between experimental and control groups, with increase in most of the career dimensions, among the experimental group. The career seminar produced a medium mean effect size of .53. The intervention positively affected undergraduates’ career self-management processual behaviors.