Pathfinders is a career discovery experience designed to help you explore different career paths and gain more clarity about your future.

Pathfinders: Discover your passions

Pathfinders is a career discovery experience designed to help you gain clarity about your future

Why Pathfinders?

Not sure what career path is best for you? That’s totally normal. Some adults still haven’t figured it out.

But… what if you could learn more about a subject that excites you? What if you could see what a cool job or degree might look like out there in the “real” world?

Enter: Pathfinders

In this program you will...

Get matched with three expert mentors

  • Choose three subject fields that most interest you

  • Get matched with mentors specializing in each of your chosen fields

  • Flexibly schedule each session to work, no matter how you busy you are

Engage in conversations customized to you

  • Gain knowledge about the fields you’re interested in

  • Ask your specific questions in two-way conversation

  • Get personalized advice from an expert

Reflection session

Reflect and plan next steps

  • Meet with a Polygence Educator after your three mentor sessions

  • Get help connecting the dots about your interests  

  • Define clear next steps towards your new goal

What your program could look like:

Session 1: Biology with Quan

MD Candidate at Stanford

Sample questions you could ask:

  • What is a day in the life of a cancer biologist like?

  • How did Quan realize she wanted to be a biologist?

  • What research is she doing? What questions is she thinking about?

  • What’s the hardest thing about her work?

Session 2: Engineering with Amin

PhD Candidate at Princeton University

Sample questions you could ask:

  • What kinds of decisions did Amin make to get into college?

  • What is his favorite thing about his research?

  • Are you able to establish a work/life balance in your field?

  • What steps did you take to earn your current position?

Session 3: Public Health with Kalifa

MD Candidate at University of Wisconsin

Sample questions you could ask:

  • How did Kalifa realize she wanted to specialize in public health?

  • What surprised her the most about her industry?

  • What was college like for Kalifa?

  • What resources should I look at to dive deeper?

Reflection session

Session 4: Reflection Session

with Polygence Educator

What you'll do:

  • Reflect on key learnings from the three conversations

  • Get help to synthesize learnings about oneself

  • Identify clear next steps to take to further explore career paths

Note: You don’t need to pick three different subjects. Some students pick just one, such as Biology, and then use Pathfinders to meet with three mentors who all specialize in different topics within the field of Biology.

Is Pathfinders Right for You?

Pathfinders is best if you want to:

Dive deeper into a field to see if it truly interests you

Explore possibilities within a career to help you specialize

Learn how someone else has succeeded in a field so you can follow in their footsteps

Cast a wider net to find options among a few of your different interests

How it works

1. Sign Up

Begin by creating a Polygence account and then, you'll be prompted to complete the 5 minute Pathfinders sign up process.

Once complete, sit tight for up to 2 weeks while Polygence works hard to find the perfect mentors, personalized to you.

Tuition: $595 USD

2. Discover

Once matched, we’ll email you instructions guiding you to:

  • Log in to the Polygence platform

  • Begin scheduling with your mentors

  • Enjoy your conversations and get your questions answered

3. Reflect

After meeting with each mentor, you will:

  • Schedule a Reflection Session with a Polygence guide

  • Share your experience

  • Discuss next steps you can take to further explore your passions.

Mentor Spotlight

You'll get matched with three mentors from our network of over 2000 mentors specializing in every field you can imagine:

Filter by subject

No mentors found for this subject, yet.