Although career orientation classes have not revealed
anything new about my interests, they have shown me much more about myself than
I could possibly know. I am a person of numbers and logic, and having my
personality determined by a test was especially interesting. My IB program
guiding, however, has been up to this point mostly irrelevant. Take the opinion
survey we recently took in class, for instance. It included all the courses
that the school could possibly consider offering if we demonstrated interest.
Honestly, I would like all those courses to be offered, which resulted in me
writing too many neutral scores for them and not actually choosing my
favorites, apart from Physics HL and Chemistry HL, the latter of which is
extremely unlikely to become part of the ISC curriculum considering the lack of
interest from my peers and the widespread fear of failure in my class.
Hopefully the school will get back to us soon with more concise choices and
actual guidance. I do not feel particularly ready for the IB, but I believe it cannot be much harder than Sophomore year. All I have to do is work hard.
While the results of my Holland codes and Meyer-Briggs
indicators did not surprise me at all, as the exact sciences have been my area
of interest ever since I can remember; the results showed me a great number of
majors not closely related to this field but that should still satisfy my
personality, giving me a wider range of ideas to choose from. However, I am
very unlikely to choose another area, as not only do I prefer Mathematics and
Science; I am actually better in these areas. Meyer-Briggs, by the way, was a
method initially developed by Swiss psychotherapist Carl Jung, considered the
founder of analytical psychology.
I am a little worried by the fact my personality tests
seem to indicate my best occupation would be working as some sort of computer
programmer or physicist/mathematician for a big company or a university.
Although I can imagine myself being really happy as a scientist of some kind, I
would prefer a career that has some real power. From politics to education, I witness
incompetence on a daily basis in Brazil. It is my belief that I should actually
try to improve my country and, if possible; the world in some way; not simply
spend my life working in some lab or office, even if the work results in a
Nobel Prize. Still, I am excited by the fact the surveys have confirmed my
preference for the exact sciences. Math and science might not be the areas most
global leaders come from, but they are my favorites and I am quite sure I will
be happy if I choose a career in this area.
In order to actually put what I have learned this
semester in practice, I believe I will actually have to dedicate some of my
time towards developing an effective online image and associating it with my areas
of interest now, not after I finish high school. Honestly, I find it hard to
connect myself to the scientific community before actually joining it,
especially considering I am not some kind of computer genius who has been
developing apps since he was 12. However, I believe I will be able to achieve
my current goals because sooner or later, an opportunity to develop something meaningful
will show up. All I need to do is prepare for it. Moreover, if others have become student-scientists during high school before, I can certainly do the same. Dedication is key.
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