'Centralized' college, job opportunity portal for high school, college students unveiled

GoEducate, Inc. unveiled what it calls a "centralized portal" for more than just high school students to aid them in their search for college programs and job opportunities. GoEducate Sacramento is a new website created with the intention of being a one-stop shop for opportunities, whether it be college programs or employment opportunities. While there is a focus on teens to young adults using this website, it is open and free to anyone, as it does not require a school email to use, according to Chief Marketing Officer Timothy Johnson. Johnson said the main objective with GoEducate is "empowering students, job seekers, military veterans and underrepresented and underserved individuals to have equal access to the information needed to make informed decisions on their career and, ultimately, their future." GoEducate serves a variety of regions, including the Sacramento area. By visiting region-specific portals, website visitors can narrow down jobs and college programs within their region and can branch out to other regions as they so choose. College programs such as Sacramento City College, Sacramento State, Sierra College, Jessup University, Chico State, Woodland Community College and UC Davis are included in the Sacramento portal. Students can enroll in any college program or add existing programs to their profile with the click of a button. Unique job opportunities are also offered, including positions where an Associate's or Bachelor's degree is not required. Johnson recognizes that "college isn't for everyone," thus trade opportunities are also available. Some trade programs can take as little as six months to complete, according to Johnson, which could give a high school student a career just six months after graduation. Any job opportunities can be found through the website's search. Filters such as the type of job (job, internship, apprenticeship), keywords, company, remote or in-person and location can be used to find the perfect opportunity. GoEducate features opportunities from local companies, including the Roseville Chamber of Commerce, Kaiser Permanente, Siemens, Advanced IPM and Sutter Health. All opportunities via companies or colleges are purely informational. GoEducate is not sponsored by them in any way. Information regarding jobs and college programs can also be found through GoEducate, including the average tuition paid for a specific college program, average wages for a specific career path, career trends and job openings, which are all specific to each region. GoEducate has provided local high schools with onboarding sessions to their website, including Del Oro, Rocklin, Woodcreek, Oakmont, Placer and Design Tech, according to Chief Officer Frances Winters. "We're actively seeking users from the regional high schools. So, we've attended different events in the region, and we've gone to different campuses and shared the portal. Because it's free, we're really just trying to get the message out there that this is a tool that all high school students can use," Winters said. "What the high school students are very interested in is the exploratory piece because they don't have anyone that is able to share all of this information with them in one place. Counselors don't have access to all of this information; parents don't have it. And, we're finding that students want to be able to explore this on their own, at their own pace, on a phone or a digital device. So, they really like the aspect of being able to go in and see everything and having all the options." Through onboarding, students created profiles including the necessities of a résumé. Not only can employers use their profile as a résumé, students can print their profile in a résumé format for applying to jobs in person. Said Johnson, "It's really engaging and connecting students and job seekers through a lifelong, free, career résumé profile that they have access to, that they can do a myriad of activities on. They can be building out a full-fledged résumé that's both shareable via a unique URL that they have, they can download a PDF version, so a lot of interesting ways they can use the résumé." Skills added to profiles are also "prolifically used" throughout the site, according to Johnson. "We algorithmically match job ads to programs via skills, and we match users to jobs via skills as well. So, there's a nice holistic, full-circle action taking place there." What is also beneficial about having a regional portal is local students are now capable of providing local employers with solely local talent in what Johnson calls a "talent pipeline." The access students, and more, now have at their fingertips makes finding college programs and job opportunities much easier.