Job Programs Something Special in Summer for Disadvantaged Youths

In the mid-1970s, before comedian Whoopi Goldberg was starring in movies and receiving standing ovations, she was a poor, black teen-ager in San Diego who wasn’t sure how to get a break.

Times haven’t changed much for some disadvantaged youths in the city. When thousands of young San Diegans get out of school and pour into the job market, looking for temporary ways to bide their summer time and expenses, those who are members of minorities or the poor may find the task more difficult than others, contend some civic leaders.

But what worked for Goldberg then, they say, can work for San Diego’s youth today.

The world-famous actress got a job and broke into acting through Hire-A-Youth, one of several programs throughout the county that trains and finds jobs for disadvantaged young people.

Programs such as Hire-A-Youth, including similar services of the Urban League and the city of San Diego and the county, get youths off the streets and into jobs that train, teach and pay, organizers say.

“We serve the hard-to-serve kids. These are kids who have barriers to employment, like income and drugs, or they’re dropouts or unwed, teen-age mothers. Some of them probably have run with gangs or could run with gangs,” said Earl Parker, marketing director for the Private Industry Council/Regional Employment Training Consortium, which oversees Hire-A-Youth. “Our goal is to find work for every one of them.”

Pays Minimum Wages

PIC/RETC, a conglomeration of civic groups and private businesses that receives $3.6 million from the city, county and federal government, will offer 7,000 jobs this summer to youths 14 to 21. Since 1983, about 45,000 kids have been placed in such Hire-A-Youth jobs.

The jobs, paying the minimum wage of $4.25 an hour, include computer processing, clerical work, craft apprenticeships, stockyard work and manual labor, program directors say. And innovative work is available as well. Whoopi Goldberg, for example, was placed in an acting group through the program, Parker said.

Juan Mendez will have one of those jobs. Mendez, a junior at San Diego High School, entered the program last summer, after fast-food restaurants turned him away because of his inexperience. Through Hire-A-Youth, the 17-year-old earned the minimum wage by coaching a baseball team and working at a youth center. Today, he is taking classes sponsored by PIC/RETC on how to prepare for work, and getting ready to start a new job.

Without the program, “I’d probably be doing something I’m not supposed to do,” said Mendez, whose low-income family lives in Southeast San Diego. “It’s easy if you don’t have a job to get involved in drugs and things like that.”

Hire-A-Youth has two components. The first, a program subsidized by federal funds, pays public and nonprofit employers, such as the city and the Navy, to put young people from low-income families to work. Youth eligible for the program are trained on work etiquette and ethics, then receive 180 hours each of paid employment. About 3,000 jobs are available through this subsidized component of the program.

Path to Permanent Work

“We try to match the kids with their interests and desired careers, and the employers help the kids with their remedial skills, like reading and writing,” Parker said.

The second component will offer about 4,000 private sector jobs for youths 16 to 21, regardless of their family’s income. Local businesses request workers, and Hire-A-Youth staff try to match the work available to the youths’ interests, Parker said.

Young people employed through this service may be kept as part- or full-time workers after the summer ends.

Vincent Le, 19, got several jobs last summer through the Hire-A-Youth program, including two with electronics companies. A Vietnamese immigrant, he was trying to make money to support himself and help his parents, who still live in Vietnam.

The Hire-A-Youth program “gave me a couple of choices to choose from, and asked what type of work I’d like to do,” said Le, an electronics repairman whose temporary job with Southwest Cable TV is now a full-time position. Le said he hopes to be an electronics designer or engineer.

Fitting a youngster’s interests to the job is an important part of youth employment programs, organizers say.

“This is more than just summer jobs,” said Rick Simon, program director for the Regional Youth Employment Program, which contracts with PIC/RETC to offer Hire-A-Youth in Southeast and downtown San Diego neighborhoods. Other contractors offer the program in North County and surrounding areas.

About 90% of the young people employed through Simon’s agency are from minorities, he said. At least 30% come from welfare families, in which they receive little or no exposure to the world of work and paychecks.

“Some kids come in and say, ‘I’d like to be a janitor,’ because they’ve never been exposed to other opportunities,” Simon said. “Our primary purpose is to get kids exposed to working. Many of the young people we work with, it’s their first job, and they need to know how to dress properly, get along with fellow workers and know what to expect. The whole idea is to open up opportunities for them.”

Directors of such programs concede that such employment services have some problems. Employers don’t always trust kids with troubled backgrounds, and some inexperienced youngsters find their first jobs too difficult to handle, they said.

“The main drawback, though, is that we always have more kids asking for jobs than jobs available,” Simon said. “There’s no end to the number of kids who need jobs.”