How Career Literacy Turns Exploration Into Job-Ready Skills
Ask hiring managers about the career readiness of recent graduates, and you’ll hear about gaps, particularly around skills.
In a 2025 survey from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and College Board polled 500 hiring managers. Of the hiring managers surveyed, 84% said high school graduates are not prepared for the workforce. Eighty percent said today’s high school graduates are less prepared than previous generations.
College graduates face a similar verdict. Gallup and the Lumina Foundation surveyed 2,000 employers for a 2026 study. Only 54% of those employers said colleges are producing graduates with the competencies their businesses need. Nearly 70% said recent graduates need moderate or significant additional training to succeed on the job.
The shortfall persists even though nearly every district offers career programming. National Center for Education Statistics data from 2016–17, the most recent available, show 98% of public districts offering high school CTE.
Hiring managers put the most weight on experience. Nearly 90% of the Chamber survey’s hiring managers value real-world experience from internships, CTE, or jobs above other preparation. Experience builds career literacy, which combines knowledge of what a job involves with the professional skills to do it well. Career exploration videos show every student what that experience looks like, including students without an internship.
What Career Readiness Really Means in 2026
Career readiness is a common goal with an unsettled definition. Employer surveys, including the Chamber report and NACE’s annual Job Outlook, name the same professional skills year after year:
- Solving problems in real time
- Communicating clearly and persuasively with coworkers and customers
- Using sound judgment under pressure
- Working well on a team
- Following workplace norms and etiquette
Students learn these skills most directly at work. On a job site or a hospital floor, a student watches experienced people handle the work and then tries it.
Few schools can send every student to a courtroom, restaurant kitchen, or auto shop as often as they would like. Career exploration videos bring those workplaces into class without a bus or an employer willing to host a fourteen-year-old.
Students Build Career Literacy by Watching the Work Get Done
Video shows students the parts of a job that written descriptions leave out, such as pacing and judgment calls. Medical and dental educators have tested video against other teaching methods in fields where mistakes are costly.
- A 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis published in BMC Medical Education found that dental students taught with video-based instruction showed a large improvement in skill acquisition compared to those taught with live demonstrations alone.
- In a randomized controlled trial published in the Journal of Minimally Invasive Gynecology, video learners reviewed the material faster and were more likely to correctly explain the technique even when they couldn’t yet execute it, compared to those taught with text.
Video’s advantage in teaching a hands-on skill matters even more given how this generation already takes in information:
- Video had been very important in helping them learn something they’d never done before, according to 53% of 18-to-29-year-olds in Pearson’s 2018 survey.
- That reliance has only grown since, with 58% of Gen Z now saying they spend more time watching social media video, like TikTok or YouTube, than subscription services like Netflix or Hulu, compared to 44% of millennials, according to Deloitte’s 2025 Digital Media Trends survey.
- TikTok itself has moved beyond entertainment into a source of information. Pew Research Center found that 43% of adults under 30 now regularly get news from the platform, up from just 9% in 2020.
Each generation since millennials has leaned on video more than the one before it, and each generation to come is on track to lean on it even more. Utilizing career exploration videos is simply meeting students where they’re at.
8,000+ Videos Built for Career Literacy, Backed by ACTE
ACTE's framework, used to evaluate CTE quality across 38 states, is the same standard this collection was built to meet.
Explore the CollectionWhat to Look for in Career Readiness Resources
A career exploration video collection is worth a multiyear investment when it delivers five qualities:
Breadth
Coverage across every career cluster, so one resource supports the full range of pathways a program needs to offer.
Depth
Equipment-rich instruction that goes past a surface-level overview into the actual mechanics of the job.
Currency
Content that keeps up with how work is changing, such as remote work, workplace wellbeing, and current workplace tools.
Flexibility
A resource that supplements your existing program without requiring a new curriculum.
Credibility
A resource evaluated against an outside standard, verified independently rather than through its own marketing.
Many CTE programs measure quality against ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework. The Association for Career and Technical Education built the framework through research, practitioner feedback, and pilot testing. The 2018 version organizes more than 90 criteria under 12 elements.
Programs use the framework as a voluntary self-evaluation tool. A program’s instructional materials count toward several of the framework’s elements. The framework applies to programs of study that span secondary and postsecondary education. The same criteria fit a high school pathway and a two-year technical program.
What the Research Says About Skills and the Workplace
ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework treats employability skills as part of the curriculum. Under its first element, Standards-aligned and Integrated Curriculum, the framework calls for employability skill standards. Those standards cover skills such as problem solving, critical thinking, teamwork, communications, and workplace etiquette.
Employer research shows why those skills belong in the curriculum alongside technical content. Employers in NACE’s Job Outlook 2025 survey, reported by the NIH’s Office of Intramural Training and Education, ranked problem-solving, teamwork, and written communication as the top skills they seek.
Graduates see their own abilities differently. New graduates rate their critical thinking and communication about 25 percentage points higher than employers do, according to NACE. For professionalism, the gap between graduate and employer ratings is roughly 30 points.
Students show the same confidence in the 2026 Gallup and Lumina research. In that study, 93% of bachelor’s students said their school is teaching the skills they need.
Delmond’s “The Roots and Future of Information Literacy” cites studies linking information literacy to workplace performance and employee innovation.
Graduates overestimate their ability in the skills employers rank highest. CTE programs can close that gap by teaching those skills directly.
How Infobase's CTE Collection Supports Career Literacy
Infobase developed the expanded Career and Technical Education Collection with ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework in mind. Every video in the collection maps to one of Advance CTE’s 14 career clusters or teaches an employability skill.
The collection delivers on the five qualities from the checklist above:
- Breadth: More than 8,000 videos span all 14 career clusters, from skilled trades to healthcare to tech.
- Depth: 250 evergreen occupation profiles give students a close, sustained look at specific jobs before they choose a path.
- Currency: New 2025–26 titles like Remote Work Essentials and Wellbeing Essentials respond directly to how work is shifting, and a set of 800 videos added in 2026 covers the latest Microsoft technologies.
- Flexibility: The collection is a standalone subscription, so a program adds exactly the career content it needs and drops it into existing coursework, no new curriculum or bigger platform required.
- Credibility: Every title maps to ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework or to a core employability skill.
Titles on customer service, conflict resolution, and emotional intelligence show how professionals handle difficult conversations at work. Students see that judgment in action whether or not their program can place them in an internship.
FAQ About Career Readiness and Career Literacy
The strongest resources show students a wide range of careers and teach the professional skills employers want. Video collections suit this work because students can watch professionals handle real situations. Compare options on cluster coverage, new titles, fit with existing courses, and grounding in a recognized CTE framework.
Career exploration videos give students structured, repeatable exposure to jobs across every cluster. A 2025 meta-analysis published in BMC Medical Education found that students taught with video outperformed peers taught by live demonstration. Paired with hands-on practice, video moves students from general interest in a field toward an understanding of specific work.
Schools should look for coverage of every cluster their program teaches and instruction that shows the equipment involved in each job. A strong collection also adds titles as the workplace changes. The collection should supplement current courses without requiring a new curriculum.
Career Exploration Built for the Skills Employers Want
Infobase developed the Career and Technical Education Collection with ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework in mind. More than 8,000 videos combine career exploration and professional skills instruction in one subscription.
