Finding Your Compass
Helping students understand who they are before deciding where they are going.
Embedded Files
More than a plan for the future
More than a plan for the future
High school students are constantly asked what comes next: what they want to study, what career they want, and what kind of future they are building. Finding Your Compass gives students space to step back from those decisions and better understand the person making them.
Through personal reflection and dialogue, students explore what gives them energy, what others rely on them for, the issues they notice in the world, and the person they care about becoming.
The workshop then turns outward. Students consider how labels, assumptions, and the way they understand themselves can shape their relationships with others. They practice approaching people with more curiosity, listening more closely, and making room for experiences that may be different from their own.
The goal is not for students to leave with a perfect plan. It is for them to leave with a clearer sense of what matters to them and how they want to move through the world with other people.
Grades
Grades
Juniors and Seniors
Session Length
Session Length
60-80 Minutes
Group Size
Group Size
Up to 2 Classes of Students
What Students Explore
What Gives Me Energy?
Students reflect on the activities, relationships, and experiences that make them feel energized and engaged.
What Do People Come to Me For?
Students identify strengths that others recognize in them, including qualities they may overlook in themselves.
What Issues Do I Notice in the World?
Students consider the problems, needs, and questions that consistently hold their attention.
Who Do I Care About Becoming?
Students think beyond resume items to reflect on the values and qualities they want to embody.
Inside the Workshop
Inside the Workshop
Creating a Personal Compass:
Using a redesigned Ikigai-inspired activity, students explore how their interests, strengths, concerns, and values overlap. Students identify the ideas they want to use as guideposts when making choices, facing uncertainty, and thinking about their futures.
Looking Beyond Labels:
Students examine the labels placed on them by themselves and others by identifying assumptions and understanding the purpose they have in attempting to understand others. We then build skills and challenge students to look beyond the assumptions by asking questions that may reveal someone else's compass.
Making Space to be a Teenager:
In our full 80-minute workshop, students also have time for creativity and low-pressure self-expression. Not every reflection has to become a five-year plan.
A Compass, Not a Map:
A Compass, Not a Map:
Finding Your Compass is not a career test or a fixed plan for the future.
It helps students identify the values, questions, and strengths they can return to as their interests and circumstances change.
Bring Finding Your Compass to your students:
Bring Finding Your Compass to your students:
Finding Your Compass can be adapted for classrooms, advisory periods, leadership programs, or larger student cohorts. We work with schools to fit the workshop into class periods or block schedules and tailor the experience to the needs of each group.
Programs are available in 60- and 80-minute formats. We also work with schools to find an approach that fits their schedule, goals, and budget.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse