Texas Career Development Association is the division of the Texas Counseling Association dedicated to promoting a greater understanding of career development through the lifespan. TCDA supports those professionals who are in positions of helping people gain understanding of career development, as well as how to overcome barriers in their development as a functional employee, or future employee, in the ever-changing world of work.

TCDA strives to:

• Promote a greater understanding of the meaning of work.
• Foster vocational development over the lifespan.
• Establish and improve standards of professional service in the field of vocational development.

Counselors of all levels and work environments deal with career issues on a frequent basis. For example:

• A Play Therapist helping a worried child whose father has been laid off from his job.
• A Marriage and Family Therapist working with a couple where one spouse has been transferred out of state.
• A High School Counselor doing guidance activities on how to choose a college or interview for a job.
• A Gerontology Counselor helping the newly retired adjust and find new meaning in their lives without work.
• An Elementary School Counselor helping a withdrawn child who is reluctant to make friends because his father’s work has moved him so often.
• A Private Practitioner working with a middle aged woman who has never worked outside the home.

TCDA also serves as the state division for the National Career Development Association.