College Career Compass™
Discover Your Direction™
Helping students discover who they are before deciding where they're going.
Most students spend years learning academic subjects but very little time learning about themselves.
Discover Your Direction™ is an inquiry-based college- and career-readiness elective that helps students explore who they are, what matters to them, and where their strengths, interests, values, and curiosities may lead.
Through guided reflection, visual mapping, curiosity-driven prompts, career exploration, discussion, research activities, and portfolio-building, students learn to notice patterns, ask meaningful questions, and connect self-discovery to future possibilities.
Students do not need to have life figured out.
They do need direction.
What Students Will Learn
Students learn how to understand themselves more deeply, recognize patterns in who they are, and explore future possibilities with greater clarity, confidence, and direction.
→ Self-Awareness & Identity
Students learn how their strengths, interests, values, aptitudes, experiences, motivation, energy, learning preferences, and mindset shape how they see themselves, make decisions, and approach their future.
→ Patterns, Possibilities & Fit
Students learn how to notice meaningful connections across what they enjoy, what matters to them, how they learn, where they feel energized, and what kinds of environments, roles, and pathways may fit.
→ Career Curiosity & Guided Exploration
Students learn how to explore career fields and future possibilities through inquiry, reflection, and guided exploration without the pressure of choosing a final path too early.
→ Confidence, Clarity & Direction
Students learn how self-discovery and reflection can help them move from uncertainty, comparison, or overwhelm toward a clearer sense of personal direction.
→ Connection to Future Planning
Students learn how who they are today can connect to the academic choices, career possibilities, and life directions they may want to explore next.
What Students Will Do
Students move through a guided self-discovery experience that helps them slow down, notice what matters, reflect with purpose, explore possible futures, and preserve their discoveries in a personalized portfolio.
→ Map Who They Are
Students complete guided self-discovery activities that help them identify strengths, interests, values, aptitudes, experiences, motivation, learning patterns, energy, and mindset.
→ Reflect With Purpose
Students respond to structured prompts that help them move beyond surface-level preferences and consider what gives them confidence, curiosity, meaning, energy, and direction.
→ Recognize Personal Patterns
Students look across their reflections, activities, and experiences to notice themes, connections, and clues that may point toward meaningful future possibilities.
→ Explore Career Possibilities
Students investigate career fields, areas of interest, and possible pathways through guided inquiry, research prompts, comparison activities, and reflection-based exploration.
→ Connect Insights to Direction
Students begin connecting what they are discovering about themselves to possible academic choices, career interests, life goals, and next-step decisions.
→ Build My Direction Portfolio
Students collect and organize their strongest discoveries, reflections, career insights, possible pathways, and next-step ideas in a personalized My Direction Portfolio.
How Students Show Progress
Students show progress by creating visible evidence of how their self-awareness, confidence, career curiosity, and personal direction develop over time.
→ Self-Discovery Evidence
Students complete guided activities that document what they are discovering about their strengths, interests, values, aptitudes, experiences, motivation, learning patterns, energy, and mindset.
→ Reflection & Meaning-Making Evidence
Students respond to structured prompts that show how they are thinking about who they are, what matters to them, what gives them confidence, and what they are beginning to notice about their future direction.
→ Pattern Recognition Evidence
Students identify themes, connections, and recurring clues across their reflections, activities, and experiences to better understand what may fit them and why.
→ Career Curiosity Evidence
Students document career fields, areas of interest, questions, comparisons, pathway notes, and insights gathered through guided exploration.
→ Direction-Building Evidence
Students connect their discoveries to possible academic choices, career interests, life goals, and next-step ideas.
→ Portfolio Evidence
Students preserve their strongest reflections, discoveries, career insights, possible pathways, and next steps in their personalized My Direction Portfolio.
→ Final Outcome Evidence
A completed My Direction Portfolio shows how the student has moved from uncertainty toward greater self-awareness, clarity, confidence, and personal direction.
Final Project: My Direction Portfolio™
Students complete My Direction Portfolio™, a personalized collection of reflections, discoveries, career insights, possible pathways, and next-step ideas.
This portfolio helps students capture who they are becoming, what they are discovering, and where they may want to explore next — without the pressure of choosing a final path too early.
Course Details
CREDITS EARNED
→ 0.5 High School Elective Credit
Designed to be completed over one semester.
LEARNING EXPERIENCE
→ Self-Paced Online Course
Students move through a guided self-discovery experience that combines reflection, career curiosity, research, and portfolio-based assignments to help them build greater confidence, clarity, and direction.
WHO IT'S FOR
→ Grades 9-12
Ideal for students who want to better understand themselves, explore possible future directions, and build greater clarity, confidence, and direction before making college, career, or pathway decisions.
COURSE OUTCOME
→ Personalized Direction Portfolio
Students create a personalized portfolio that captures who they are becoming, what they are discovering, and where they may want to explore next in their academic, career, and life planning.
Credit & Documentation Note
College Career Compass™ provides high school-level elective curriculum. Families are responsible for determining credit, grades, transcript use, completion status, and state or program requirements.
Meet Your Instructor
About the Founder
Dr. Leslie Tucker is an education strategist, curriculum designer, published researcher, and founder of College Career Compass™. She holds a Ph.D. in Curriculum & Instructional Studies, a Master’s degree in Higher Education Administration, and a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology.
For nearly two decades, Dr. Tucker has worked at the intersection of educational psychology, student development, college readiness, career exploration, and future planning. She has helped students and families navigate high school planning, college admissions, scholarships, career direction, college transition, and life after graduation.
Before founding College Career Compass™, Dr. Tucker worked in higher education, where she taught Educational Psychology, supported student success and retention initiatives, and studied the factors that influence student engagement, persistence, and educational outcomes.
As both a practitioner and researcher, she became deeply concerned by a pattern she saw again and again: too many students were arriving at college without a clear understanding of who they were, what they wanted, what fit them, or how their education connected to their future.
She saw students change majors, lose confidence, accumulate debt, delay graduation, and struggle under the weight of decisions they had never been fully prepared to make. Colleges often work hard to support students after they arrive, but Dr. Tucker became passionate about reaching students earlier — before the confusion becomes costly.
That conviction led her to create College Career Compass™.
College Career Compass™ is the culmination of Dr. Tucker’s work as an educator, researcher, curriculum designer, advisor, and student success advocate. The curriculum is grounded in educational psychology, cognitive science, student development, career development, and inquiry-based learning.
Influenced by Dr. Willingham’s emphasis on teaching students how to think deeply within a discipline and Trevor MacKenzie’s inquiry mindset framework, Dr. Tucker designed College Career Compass™ to move beyond information delivery. Students do not simply learn about careers, colleges, scholarships, or future pathways. They learn how to ask better questions, recognize patterns, evaluate possibilities, connect experiences, and make thoughtful decisions.
Through guided inquiry, reflection, exploration, and action, students build the habits of mind needed to navigate college, career, and life with greater clarity, confidence, and direction.
Dr. Tucker’s mission is not to tell students who they should become.
It is to help students discover who they are becoming — and give them the tools to move forward with purpose.
Her philosophy is simple:
Students do not need to have life figured out.
They do need direction.
Why This Course Matters
Most students are asked to make major decisions about college, careers, and life after graduation before they have had enough time to explore who they are, what matters to them, and what fits.
Discover Your Direction™ gives students structured space to reflect, explore, and build confidence before making expensive next-step decisions.
Your student does not need to have life figured out.
They do need direction.
College is too expensive to be a guessing game.
Course Access
Discover Your Direction™ is available as a self-paced online elective through College Career Compass™.
Students receive access to guided lessons, inquiry-based reflections, career exploration activities, and portofolio-based assignements that build toward a final Direction Portfolio.
COLLEGE CAREER COMPASS™ | Support Document System
FAQ | Policy | Access | Fee Schedule | Transcript Guidance | Provider Overview
1. Provider Overview and Credentials
2. Course Access & Delivery Instructions