The 2022 Utah Talent Report looks at anonymized, aggregated YouScience Discovery results for more than 23,000 Utah secondary students.1 Results show that YouScience Discovery empowers Utah students and educators to close the exposure gap.
What’s the exposure gap?
It’s the disconnect between what a student is capable of and what a student knows about. It happens when students look at careers based on their life experiences or media consumption. Their limited experience limits the careers they know about. Their lack of self awareness also limits what they believe they’re capable of.
In 2021, Utah took a critical step for its students
In 2021, Utah empowered middle and high schools with YouScience Discovery. Discovery lets students uncover their natural talents and best-fit careers. Not the careers they see on social media – real-world in-demand careers that match students’ aptitudes with industry needs.
The 2022 Utah Talent Report examines anonymized data from the initial few months of Discovery’s use in Utah schools. Results show Utah students are interested in careers they don’t have aptitudes for and have aptitudes for careers they don’t know about. That’s an exposure gap.
For instance, of the top 50 career recommendations for interest-only, 74% directed students to arts and entertainment, education, social work and life sciences careers. On the flip side, 0% of the top 50 interest-only recommendations directed students to in-demand careers, in engineering, healthcare and technology — but 50% of aptitude-based recommendations directed students to these careers.
That means Utah student have aptitudes to thrive in careers in engineering, healthcare and technology.
Result were similar for Utah middle schoolers. They had 4x the aptitude for computer and technology careers as interest.
Utah is closing the exposure gap
Discovery is empowering Utah students and educators to connect talent and in-demand careers like never before. When students are empowered to discover where they have natural abilities and areas they have the ability to master, they see a whole new world of career opportunities.
In fact, in Discovery, students see more than 500 in-demand, real-world careers from O*NET OnLine, the nation’s primary source of occupational information. They see how careers align to their specific talents and interests or both; the educational pathways needed for those careers, including college, licenses and certifications (where applicable); and Utah employers in need of those talents and certifications.
With Discovery, Utah students are connecting what they’re learning with why they’re learning it. They’re finding hope and purpose and an accessible pathway toward a successful future. They’re finding they have high aptitudes for in-demand careers — the very careers needed by Utah employers.
Access the full report to learn more.
To learn more about aptitude-based career guidance, Contact YouScience.
1 Findings were extracted from anonymized aggregated YouScience Discovery results for 15,730 Utah middle schoolers and 7,847 Utah high schoolers for the 2021 calendar year. Demographic breakdowns can be found in the full report.