A study links career literacy with job security, income and savings, while educators call for earlier skills training and stronger employer ties.
Career planning is becoming a continuing skill rather than a one-time school exercise. A report from The DeBruce Foundation links career literacy with employment security, income, satisfaction with nonwage benefits and long-term savings. The findings point to a practical challenge for employers and educators: people need help recognizing what they do well and connecting those strengths to opportunities as work changes.
The report draws on nationally representative surveys of about 36,000 Americans ages 18 to 64, conducted between 2021 and 2025. It also associates career literacy with a greater ability to handle job disruptions and career transitions. Those relationships don’t establish that career planning alone produces better outcomes, but they suggest that workers who can assess options and make informed moves may be better prepared when circumstances shift.
Career skills extend beyond choosing a first job
The DeBruce Foundation, a nonprofit focused on expanding career pathways and readiness resources, defines career literacy as the ability to understand, plan and navigate a range of career paths over a lifetime. Leigh Anne Taylor Knight, the foundation’s executive director and chief operating officer, described it as knowing what someone likes to do and does well, forming a vision for the future, and having the confidence to consider different opportunities.
That broad definition matters because students entering the workforce are likely to move through multiple careers, Taylor Knight told Education Week. A plan focused only on a first job can quickly become outdated. The more durable capability is learning to reassess strengths, spot openings and decide what next step makes sense.
That need is growing amid an uncertain labor market and the expanding use of generative artificial intelligence. A recent report from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco found that finding a job has become harder for most people over the past couple of years. In such conditions, career awareness can help people think through transitions, even though it can’t remove the uncertainty or guarantee a particular outcome.
Schools can connect strengths to work
The report’s authors argue that career literacy develops over time, making early education a useful place to build it. Students can learn to identify the skills they enjoy using, recognize where they perform well, and see how those abilities relate to work. They also need practice searching for opportunities, comparing options and acting with greater independence.
Many K-12 districts are expanding work-based learning and career and technical education programs in response to student demand for broader exposure to post-high-school paths. Some aim for students to leave with industry-recognized credentials or college credits. These programs can give learners a first-hand view of different kinds of work and a chance to build skills before entering a job.
But preparation for a first role is only part of the task. Taylor Knight said students should also receive information that helps them think about the next three career steps they might take. That approach treats career planning as something to revisit as a person gains experience, learns more about their strengths and encounters new options.
Brooke Kusch, vice president of the counseling and career development division for the Association for Career and Technical Education, said career-readiness curricula should look beyond students’ interests. In her view, students also need to understand their aptitudes and strongest skill sets, since those can serve them over time.
Plans need room to guide decisions
Some states require students to have a career plan before graduation, but Kusch said those plans may not be used to their full potential. In Oklahoma, where she works as a career counselor at a technical education center serving high school students and adults, she described the individualized plan as an unfunded requirement that can become a box to check. She said it could be used more effectively to build career literacy, while adding that schools are on the right path.
Turning a plan into useful guidance takes time and coordination. Graduation requirements in subjects such as math and science leave limited room in a student’s schedule for extra training and career exploration. Kusch said schools have to weigh how to fit credentials and broader preparation into the hours available.
Coordination is another obstacle. Career and technical education programs can operate in separate tracks, with limited alignment among K-12 schools, postsecondary options and employers. Advance CTE, a national nonprofit representing state career and technical education leaders, introduced a vision earlier in 2026 centered on connecting students’ education more closely with career opportunities and reducing those divisions.
Taylor Knight said schools can’t build career literacy on their own. Businesses, chambers, civic organizations, families and other community members all have a role in helping students understand the work available around them. For employers, that involvement can mean helping learners see how skills translate into actual roles and what capabilities those roles call for.
The report’s central lesson is that career readiness is less about locking in a single destination than learning how to make informed choices over time. Schools can give students a foundation; employers and communities can help connect that foundation to real opportunities. The next measure of progress is whether career plans become working tools that guide exploration, training and the steps that follow a first job.
