Online resources -- from schools and professional associations to labor market information -- are increasingly important for career counselors. Counselors using online resources can find information related to professional news and college applications. They can even find counseling-related games to engage students in learning about the world of work.

These resources, counselors say, help them remain on top of their profession.

"You're expected to be an expert on 100,000 different occupations," says career counselor Martha Wiseman. "And there's just no way."

Counselors use the Web as a search vehicle to find information related to any career or educational program. This, they say, helps them keep their skills up to date.

"I had a girl come in the other day and she said, 'Well, what's the difference between an optometrist, an ophthalmologist and an optician?' I kind of knew, but I didn't want to tell her the wrong thing," says Wiseman.

Wiseman says she and the student simply went to an online career service and pulled up information about each of the careers.

The Web can provide salary information for students wondering whether that obscure arts career will bring in enough money to keep food on the table. Or it can tell you what type of education a student will need to get a job as a neuroscientist.

But without proper management of Web resources, career counselors throughout North America could drown in a digital deluge. Wiseman has found that organizing the mass of resource information on the Web is more than a virtual hassle.

"Eventually, I ended up with so many bookmarks I got totally confused and I couldn't remember which one was for what anymore," she says. In time, she turned the information into a Web page that she uses in counseling both for herself and her students.

Janelle Beblow is a career advisor. She agrees that the Web gives advisors wider access to resources, especially for students going back to school.

"In the past, we would have had to request calendars from every educational institution," she says. "Now, just about every school has their own Web page."

She says in that sense, the Web has made her job easier. "The way it's made it more difficult is just that there's so much information that we have to sift through to make it manageable for our clients."

In order to deal with the pile of information counselors have to filter through and organize, some institutions are working in concert with schools to assemble resources for career counselors and educators.

One such collaboration was put together by the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and the National and State Occupational Information Coordinating Committee.

Chris Kirkman is a webmaster and program coordinator with the project. The International Career Development Library, as it's called, provides an online resource for counselors, students and teachers.

The project started in 1998. Since then, the demand for the resource and online resources in general has grown, says Kirkman.

"We've got a lot of e-mails from people using it for classes and for their own work. It appears to be a need."

When Kirkman started working at the university a few years ago, he was fielding e-mail questions from teachers and researchers. He searched databases and combed the Internet for information relating to lesson plans, for example, or studies on behavior problems in the classroom.

"After doing that for about a year, I realized that online resources become a primary resource for people," Kirkman says. "I think I became sort of amazed in the fact that people started turning towards the Internet for information rather than going to local resources like your library or public health facility."

Certainly, the impulse to go first to the Internet has something to do with the fact that information on the Web is cheap, fast and becoming more and more credible. Plus, you don't have to leave your home or your office.

Kirkman suggests that there are other issues at play as well. "I think cost becomes an issue when you're publishing books and magazines and pamphlets," he says. "I know with us, we've tried to cut office costs by putting things online -- like the newsletter."

Thankfully for counselors, a lot of resources on the Web are put out by reputable companies that have a long pre-Internet history.

The National Career Development Association (NCDA) has been around since 1913. The NCDA has been online since 1999.

Its Web site includes an array of different resources -- policy statements, endorsements of other sites and lists of publications. It also has a well-designed links section, broken down into areas of interest such as occupation, education and financial aid.

The NCDA provides career development journals and a newsletter to help counselors stay current. And it offers professional development through conferences and regional activities.

The association's international membership is near 5,000, according to executive director Deneen Pennington. Most services are available only to members. However, the NCDA also provides career resources for the general public.

Pennington says the response to online services from career counselors has been "incredible."

"We've had so much more going on the Web as well as the information that we're getting back from our members," Pennington says. "That's the first point of contact. Our people are very well educated, so they use the website a lot."

The Net is the perfect resource to accommodate less formal resource gathering.

"The main thing that I hear from students is 'I don't know anything about that company,'" says Mia King, an employment specialist. Her response is to tell kids, "Well, then, get on the Net and read about them. It's not like you have to phone up and ask for their annual report anymore."

Net Sites

National Career Development Association

Policies, conferences and general career development information

http://ncda.org/

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Canadian Standards and Guidelines for Career Development

Programs and services for career development

http://www.career-dev-guidelines.org/

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Counselor Resource Center

Professional development and links aimed at counseling clients from different backgrounds

http://www.crccanada.org

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