An Assessment of Trends and Issues in Career Counseling in Higher Education and Application in African Learning Context

Abstract

Career counseling assists people cope with issues associated with career or occupational aspects of their life. In educational settings, career counseling assists learners to identify, own, and manage their personal career issues and facilitate the task of finding alternative solutions. In Kenya, higher education students have key career transition struggles ranging from poor preparation from high schools, while in higher education many continue to struggle on what courses or career paths to follow and upon graduation they suffer from what employers' call ‘graduates unprepared for the world of work'. The purpose of this paper is to assess career counseling issues and trends and their implication to career counseling first in the job market and then in educational settings. The trends on career counseling tends to lean towards the western countries but in Kenyan and African context the trends become issues that career counselors will have to grapple with. The paper therefore will attempt to contextualize the trends into Kenya context so that career counseling can have relevance in meeting the students' needs.