Reflection and Next Steps

 Reflection

    Pathmapper was built with people in mind who ask for career advice but have never had access to a career counsellor. As someone who started as a tiling apprentice after high school to pursue a career in healthcare in my mid-20s while managing a movie theatre, I had to do my own research on how I could pursue the "next step up". Before AI, I was speaking to mentors, using guidance counsellors in schools, speaking to people in the field about what they enjoyed about their jobs and how to get there. Sometimes I would take the initiative to call. I think back to those days and was amazed at how much time and energy I had to get there.

    Pathmapper came to mind when I was reflecting on my current career journey, which I love, but asked the question "what if I had to do that all over again?" at close to middle age? With kids, a budget and a limited amount of time, who can I go to with those things in mind? And, looking at how we have socialized social media, I have asked through Reddit and Facebook about ways to expand my knowledge, but I've come up with the same response: dropping out of my current job to pursue full-time education, which we know is not possible.

   Pathmapper is not a new idea. There are countless career transition and personalized education applications out there that probably do it faster and better at this time. But Pathmapper takes into account the busy and constrained lifestyle that people have and tries to squeeze in the opportunity for people to educate and possibly even pursue higher learning. It also supports learners currently at a program and creates ways to supplement their current education by providing a tutoring service that is curated by experts in that field using a competency-based approach. Using an AI tool also allows people to prepare them to use AI as part of their future toolbox.