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The Working World Extravaganza (WWE) Careers Expo was held at the Feathermarket Centre, Port Elizabeth from the 16 – 18 March 2006. The breakfast launch for the event was held at the Protea Edward Hotel on the 15 March 2006.
The WWE Expo is primarily aimed at Grade 12 learners, their teachers and parents and assists them in making informed career choices. A variety of institutions, corporates, financial aid organisations, training institutions and guidance counsellors exhibit at the event and offer the learners and their parents an opportunity to discuss various career options and to also gain information about what certain careers entail. A career guidance workbook is distributed to learners before the event giving them an opportunity to work through the sections before visiting the expo and allowing them to ask more directed questions. 97 schools and approximately 11237 learners and educators visited the expo on the Thursday and Friday, with approximately 2400 visitors attending the expo on the Saturday. WWE PE was well organised and due to the workbook many of the learners coming to the expo had an idea of what kind of information they required. However, most of the learners have no idea what career path they want to follow, even though they are in Grade 12. Many of the learners also have no idea about careers linked to the marine environment and most of them had never heard of an Oceanographer, a pilot of a ship and had grand ideas of what a Marine Biologist did. The time spent at the Expo was time well spent as it gave ACEP the opportunity to discuss careers linked to the marine environment with many learners, educators and parents and also gave us the opportunity to tell the learners about the coelacanth and the Programme. Quite a number of learners had seen the article in the Sunday Times 100 years supplement and recognised the model as a coelacanth and had a number of questions that they wanted to ask about the discovery.
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