Job Program Puts Wind in Their Sails : Employment: Three receive the opportunity to learn seamanship skills on replica of a tall ship.

As part of its work to give San Diego youths a chance at jobs and training, the local Urban Corps has helped three young men launch a life of adventure on a sailing ship, learning skills that could take them around the world.

Robert Meadors, 18; Joshua Conrow, 19, and Joe Cerda, 18, are packing their sea bags for a November sail on a replica of the 1849 tall ship Californian.

They were awarded scholarships to spend five days sailing ship from Long Beach to San Diego. To prepare for their voyage, they are apprenticing with an Urban Corps and Maritime Museum project restoring the historical ferry Berkeley, docked at the Embarcadero.

They are the first members of an Urban Corps pilot project that gives youths a chance to learn skills while filling local museums’ need for workers.

“I feel privileged to work here,” Joshua Conrow said, taking a break from work on the decks of the Berkeley. “I know people who joined (the Urban Corps) but never made it through--they blew it off. And now they’re walking the streets without anything. This is it. This is my chance.”

David Richardson, coordinator of education development for the Urban Corps, said the ship project is a way to teach skills such as carpentry and painting, in addition to fine craftsmanship.

“One older generation is fading out with those (craftsmen) skills, and a new generation needs to come in and keep those skills going,” Richardson said.

Nearly 500 unemployed people 18 to 24 years old have worked with the Urban Corps of San Diego since it opened three years ago, said Sam Duran, executive director of the organization.

Participants get more from the Urban Corps than the minimum-wage pay and maintenance skills, members say. It gives a steady work history and good references.

“It’s giving me a start on a career,” said Cerda, who has worked with the Berkeley crew for four months. Urban Corps experience “gives greater possibilities to get hired. (Employers) could call over here and ask how I am. They would say he knows what he’s doing.”

“Anybody could scrape (paint from a) seat,” Cerda said. “But when you’re done scraping, what type of varnish do you use? . . . It’s learning how to paint professionally.”

Cerda hopes to someday get work as a deckhand on one of the harbor excursion boats, and “from there I could learn how to pilot one.”

“This (maritime work) is teaching you something you can use later in life,” said Conrow, who has learned painting techniques for his first six weeks working on the Berkeley. He said said he loves the art of carpentry and would like to begin learning woodworking and drafting skills on the ship.

“My cousin is building a house. I would like to have the skills to help him . . . rather than being a loss out there,” he said.

Conrow left school in the 10th grade, taking a high school equivalency exam. He said he could get another job, but the options for a drop-out are fast food restaurants or supermarkets--hardly his desire for a life career.

The Urban Corps has laid a foundation for professional work, he said, a start. Even if he dusts the seats before varnishing, Conrow says he is learning a work ethic: how to wake up on time, getting to work on time and doing a good job.