{"id":2267,"date":"2026-06-26T08:13:54","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:13:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=2267"},"modified":"2026-06-26T08:13:54","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:13:54","slug":"kids-want-to-be-influencers-when-they-grow-up-because-they-gets-lots-of-money-and-they-want-to-be-famous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=2267","title":{"rendered":"Kids want to be influencers when they grow up, because they \u2018gets lots of money\u2019 and \u2018they want to be famous\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

When we asked second graders in Wisconsin this same question, we were surprised to often receive similar answers: Kids there also wanted to be YouTube influencers when they grow up.<\/p>

Read more Snap\u2019s Evan Spiegel joins MacKenzie Scott in the billionaire race to erase medical debt\u2014wiping out $550 million for 260,000 Californians<\/a><\/p>\n

I am a scholar of career and technical education. Since 2021, colleagues and I have spoken with a range of elementary, middle and high school students as young as 7 years old in the U.S. and Norway in 2024 to understand how children imagine their careers.<\/p>

<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n

Our forthcoming research shows that social media has emerged as one of the biggest influences for young people\u2019s career choice, second only to family, friends or teachers.<\/p>\n

Over 60% of middle and high school students we surveyed from 2021-2024 said they wanted to be social media influencers or picked their future careers based on what they saw online. Other popular choices were professional soccer player, musician and actor.<\/p>\n\n

\"A<\/figure>\n
Most young people will not go on to become successful social media influencers. Artur Debat\/iStock Photos<\/figcaption>\n

Our process<\/h2>\n

In a separate January 2018 international study by the organization Education and Employers, 20,000 children, ages 7 to 11, were asked about their possible future careers and then explained how they learned about that job.<\/p>\n

We decided to use a similar approach to understand children\u2019s career dreams and influences.<\/p>\n

In Wisconsin, we surveyed more than 80 different children, ages 7 to 11. We also conducted focus groups with more than 140 middle and high school students about their academic and career plans and what influenced their ideas.<\/p>\n

We then conducted interviews in Norway with over 60 children in the same age range.<\/p>\n

In both places, we gave kids simple prompts that included \u201cWhen I grow up I would like to be \u2026 .\u201d We also asked them, \u201cHow do you know about this job?\u201d<\/p>\n

We found that there is a disconnect between how schools are helping kids think about their possible future careers and what factors are actually influencing young people as they imagine their futures.<\/p>\n

Influencer dreams<\/h2>\n

In some instances, students as young as 7 in Wisconsin and Norway simply drew the YouTube or TikTok logo, or wrote that they aspired to be an \u201cinfluencer\u201d without any idea of who or what they would influence.<\/p>\n

They shared that YouTubers and influencers \u201cgets lots of money\u201d and that \u201cthey want to be famous.\u201d<\/p>\n

Students also drew pictures of footballers, musicians, actors and princesses. Some students shared career goals like becoming a wildlife biologist, pilot, engineer or filmmaker.<\/p>\n

Older students were more likely to mention careers like nurse, electrician, engineer, teacher, welder, police officer and small-business owner \u2013 although becoming an influencer and content creator remained a common aspiration for teenagers and children.<\/p>\n

We found that social media also had a positive influence on some students.<\/p>\n

One student in a rural town said that online posts and videos encouraged them to want to become a marine biologist, even though the closest ocean is over 1,300 miles \u2013 or 2.09 million meters \u2013 away.<\/p>\n

The limited role of schools<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s common for middle and high school students to take online career interest surveys to help understand which jobs could be a good fit. Many schools also offer career fairs and job shadowing opportunities.<\/p>\n

Most students, though, receive very limited individualized guidance on career paths from a school counselor.<\/p>

Read more Everyone agrees that you hate AI, but only Mark Cuban sees why Silicon Valley is powerless to fix it<\/a><\/p>\n

But they generally do receive some kind of prompts to help them think about what sort of career they want.<\/p>\n

Within roughly the past decade, 27 states began requiring personalized, multiyear educational plans that helps students as young as 11 years old develop their own education and career goals.<\/p>\n

In 2015, for example, Wisconsin passed a new law that required school districts to provide academic and career planning services to students in grades 6 through 12. Students take an online career survey each year.<\/p>\n

The students answer questions about their interests, and the online program then names a recommended career. The list typically includes traditional jobs like electrician or accountant, rather than something more modern, like content creator.<\/p>\n

One potential reason is that many of the online career-planning programs schools use were created before social media became a central part of young people\u2019s daily lives.<\/p>\n

Some schools also have classes where high school students learn about different educational pathways and jobs. Yet these classes often meet only periodically, while high school students typically use social media every day. As a result, formal career education increasingly competes with a constant stream of online messages about work, success and the future.<\/p>\n

Our focus groups with middle and high school students in Wisconsin revealed that few students find these online career planning programs at school helpful.<\/p>\n

Students said they found career planning activities \u201credundant\u201d and described them as \u201cthe same thing we did in middle school.\u201d<\/p>\n

One 17-year-old student in Wisconsin said the career survey was a \u201cwaste of time. The test told me I should be a truck driver.\u201d This student took the survey when she had already been accepted into nursing school.<\/p>\n

Students consistently said they learned more from conversations with teachers, counselors, family members and professionals than from online questionnaires.<\/p>\n\n

\"A<\/figure>\n
While students are heavily influenced by social media, school career assessments typically don\u2019t reflect this tendency. Spencer Platt\/Getty Images<\/figcaption>\n

When dreams don\u2019t match reality<\/h2>\n

Many young people now learn about careers through TikTok videos, YouTube channels, social media personalities and online communities. These influences can play a larger role in shaping career aspirations than formal school career-planning activities.<\/p>\n

While many people aspire to make money online as influencers or content creators, nearly half of all online content creators earn less than US$15,000 a year.<\/p>\n

I think that educators and families should recognize that young people are thinking about their possible careers \u2013 they are just more likely to rely on social media, rather than online surveys at school, to imagine their futures.<\/p>\n

Matthew Simoneau, Professor of Career and Techcnical Education, University of Wisconsin-Stout Polytechnic<\/em><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.<\/em><\/p>

Read more Personal Liability Insurance for Homeowners: Coverage and Common Exclusions Explained<\/a><\/p>\n<\/figurlazyload><\/figurlazyload><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kids in Norway and Wisconsin drew the same thing when asked what they want to be: a YouTube logo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2264,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[126],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-social-media"],"yoast_head":"\nKids want to be influencers when they grow up, because they \u2018gets lots of money\u2019 and \u2018they want to be famous\u2019 - Cross Country Moving Team<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/crosscountrymovingteams.com\/?p=2267\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Kids want to be influencers when they grow up, because they \u2018gets lots of money\u2019 and \u2018they want to be famous\u2019 - 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