This article discusses the personal plans of secondary school seniors. The author discusses the research projects concerning problems of young people's orientation and choice of profession. Furthermore, the author examines the role played by objective and subjective factors in the shaping of the personal plans of senior students in secondary school, their orientation and actual paths in life. And substantial results have been obtained in the study of the influence of these factors (factors of general and primary importance, such as the type of economy, the effect of demographic processes, the transformation of education, and the state of the labor market, on the one hand, and factors of secondary importance, such as place of residence, parents' status, respondents' gender, and so on) on the orientation and behavior of young people. (Contains 1 table.)