Choose Your Career

by Dr. B Bakopoulos

Director of TopUni Network

The general advice to students present and past is to choose a career that fits their interests, aptitudes, work values and many more factors. However, in this oversaturated job market full of applicants and candidates and the paltry amount of jobs, it takes a bit more consideration given the circumstances. While students today should choose, of course, the path that feels the most right to them career-wise, they must think about job satisfaction as well. The danger of turning a passion into a career is that at some point, it no longer becomes a passion and it becomes work and a job that takes a physical and mental toll on an individual, while taking away pleasure. Choosing a career that can provide optimal levels of job satisfaction means matching the desired occupation to character traits and motivations, which means knowing more about yourself than just the surface of your likes and dislikes.

Career Tests, personality tests and assessments assess whether or not students are best fit for a job. These tests give deeper insight into less commonly known aspects of the human personality such as conscientiousness, judging or perceptive capabilities and more. This is information that serves corporations and management, as well as individuals. It is through these tests that students and young adults can find out who they are besides their likes and dislikes. It gives insight into their values, behavior and even potential career options. These suggestions are by no means limiting to certain personality types, but they are better forms of archaic and old career aptitude tests. The key to knowing how to choose a job is to know oneself—values, behavior, strengths, weaknesses, how one reacts under pressure, etc. It can seem impossible, but it is not.

International Baccalaureate I.B. Choosing subjects

by Dr. B Bakopoulos

Director of TopUni Network

The International Baccalaureate is well-established as a qualification, having been offered in international schools worldwide for many years.

If you are studying for the IB, your choice of subjects will be key to determining the university courses open to you. The choice of subjects both in standard and high level will affect the final grade which is important but it may also affect your entrance to particular course. IB students need to be advised and guided. This guidance can be used to identify the degree courses most likely to require you to have studied a certain subject at the higher level within the IB. It is less usual for universities to require particular subjects at standard level within the IB although you should always check entry requirements carefully before applying to be certain of this.

TopUni team's experience with applications to top universities and especially for a very competitive course at a university, it is important that you consider all the aspects of the entrance requirements since the age of 15.

The most important thing that your advisor will be looking for as you make your choices is information: info that you are good enough to take the subject at advanced level, or evidence that you are interested enough in a subject to take it at advanced level. It is important that your decisions are taken on the basis of accurate information and clear thinking. Whatever you choose now will commit you to certain directions at university and perhaps rule out certain careers.