NextStep is an IBM compatible, computer-assisted learning system to help users explore and reality test their tentative career plans and bring their career decision to a more real and community-oriented level. The NextStep system assumes that the user is literate and has at least one tentative occupational goal. The system is based on a cognitive-behavioral and developmental model. NextStep is targeted to secondary school students, adults in career transition, or those returning to the workforce. The program is designed to show users how to carry on with additional research and gain exposure to relevant experiences, and to give the user a specific blueprint for action. That blueprint will contain such information as names, addresses, telephone numbers, yellow page headings, names of publications, and ideas for part-time and summer jobs. Much of this information will be local in nature. By emphasizing the research component, the system can help some users to avoid locking themselves into a tentative occupational choice before they have properly explored the realities of the occupation under consideration. Some users may be recycled back to the career exploration decision making stage. A fundamental value behind the design of the NextStep program is that it is better to find out now that an occupation is inappropriate rather than after completing training or taking an entry level job. (LLL)