Abstract
Over the past four years Australia has seen a dramatic change in careers work within secondary schools from traditional vocational guidance interviews and information collection to the teaching of structured career education programs. Career education associations have been formed and resource materials have been produced by teachers and by government departments. Whilst enthusiasm at the grass roots level has produced many and varied responses to career education concepts originally promulgated in the United States and Britain, the disparity in time and facilities allocated for careers work, and the differing backgrounds of the teachers and other workers in the field make it extremely difficult to give a precise or comprehensive account of what career education means in Australia.
This paper examines several programs produced in Australia for secondary schools in terms of the modifying factors of time allocation, curriculum style and theoretical bias, and points to some of the problems that may confront career educationists in the near future.