First-Year Students' IT Career Awareness

The demand for Information Technology (IT) professionals has increased globally and has impacted the South African IT labour market. The IT skills in high demand include positions such as Software Developers, Data Scientists and Business Analysts. The choice of a career is usually made by a scholar early on in secondary school and various factors influence their career choice. Creating IT career awareness is important so that scholars understand the various IT career paths. First-year students have generally made a career choice and should be aware of the different job descriptions and job titles in industry. This study examined first-year IT and non-IT students' career awareness as a factor that influences first-year students choosing IT careers at the Nelson Mandela University in South Africa. A survey was completed by 405 first-year students and the data were statistically analysed, including Exploratory Factor Analysis. The results indicated that IT students were more aware of their careers prior to university enrolment than non-IT students and students over the age of 21 showed a better understanding of careers than students aged 21 years and younger. The results further indicated differences in the understanding of the job titles and job descriptions between respondents speaking different home languages. Finally, the paper presents recommendations for intervention strategies to create IT career awareness amongst scholars.