A personal career portfolio is a valuable organizer of student projects and assignments. It encourages students to collect examples of their work as they progress through the various activities, labs, and projects. Selecting particular items to include in a portfolio encourages students to reflect on what they have learned or accomplished and what they have yet to learn. Portfolio items may include: journal notes, drafts, photographs, audio or video tapes, computer discs, sketches, drawings, etc. Portfolios may be used for peer, teacher, and self-assessment and as a format to present selected works to parents, post-secondary institutions, or potential employers. In addition, the portfolio can demonstrate the link between home, school, and community in the student's education. Each student should have a portfolio representing his or her work during the course.

The portfolio helps students:

• reflect on personal growth and accomplishment
• see links between home, school, and community education and activities
• collect materials to prepare applications for post-secondary education and scholarship program entrance
• collect materials to prepare for employment applications
• focus on career planning.

The portfolio helps teachers:

• provide a framework for independent learning strategies for the student
• communicate student learning from one school year to another in a specific area of study
• identify career planning needs for students
• assess and evaluate the student's progress and achievement in a course of study.

The portfolio helps post-secondary institutions:

• determine suitable candidates for awards and scholarships
• evaluate candidates for program entrance
• evaluate prior learning for program placement.

The portfolio helps the community:

• reflect on the involvement in a student's education and the support offered to learners
• demonstrate the link between the home, school, and community in education.

The portfolio helps potential employers:

• identify employable skills desired in future employees
• provide evidence of knowledge and skill development of potential employees.

Students collect work over time in a working folder. Each student should also keep a journal of observations, critiques, ideas, and reflections as part of his or her working portfolio. Items in this portfolio may be used for the purpose of reflection, for ongoing and summative evaluations, for peer, teacher and self-evaluations, and for documenting skill development and mastery.

Working portfolios may be used for purposes of conferencing between student and teacher, teacher and parent, teacher and teacher, or student and student. When a teacher examines a student's portfolio in order to make a decision regarding student progress, the information it contains may become documented evidence for the evaluation.

A daily journal may also become a part of a working portfolio as a means of tracking the student's use of time and to record progress on ideas that are being developed. This will provide the student with a focus for self-directed or independent learning, as well as an anecdotal record for part of the course evaluation.

To compile a presentation portfolio, students should select items from their working portfolio. The presentation portfolio should cover the range of students' experiences and should display their best efforts. The preparation of a presentation portfolio can be an assessment strategy. It is strongly suggested that students at the 30 level prepare a presentation portfolio suitable for submission to potential employers or post-secondary institutions.

Through collecting, selecting and reflecting, students are able to compile presentation portfolios that display their best collection of work.