Teens are too busy preparing for college instead of working

by Grace

Lifeguard shortage leaves many pools, beaches unprotected

The shortage — which is being felt in cities including Columbus, Ohio; Del Rio, Texas; Tulsa; and Minneapolis — comes, in part, because many high school students spend their summers taking classes or engaging in enrichment activities to prepare for college instead of working, according to Harry Holzer, professor of public policy at Georgetown University.

Unemployment numbers released in May by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that one in four teenagers is actively seeking employment but is unable to get hired. Holzer said many of the kids who are looking for jobs are from low- or middle-income families and do not have the extra cash to spend for certification, so they do not apply for lifeguard positions.

While lifeguards are typically paid more than minimum wage, it costs about $350 to become certified as a lifeguard by the American Red Cross. This is a case where it takes money to make money. Perhaps scholarship benefactors willing to fund lifeguard certification courses could produce significant payoffs in the employment situation for at least a few deserving teens.

A local pool was still seeking lifeguards as recently as two weeks ago, well after the Memorial Day start of their season. From what I can tell, most other local summer recreation jobs get filled as early as March. While I know at least one teen who is still looking for a summer job, many local students spend their summers on enrichment activities along with family vacations and other entertaining pursuits. (I count hanging around the local Dunkin’ Donuts as an entertaining pursuit.)

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Posted on July 6, 2012 at 5:23 am in before college, paying for college, preparing for college, saving for college | RSS feed | Respond | Trackback URL

Tags: Lifeguard, summer jobs

13 Comments to “Teens are too busy preparing for college instead of working”

Bonnie
July 6, 2012 at 5:54 am

Our regular babysitter, a very nice young college student from the Bronx, has been trying unsuccessfully to find a summer camp counselor position. She is an education major, and has experience since she worked in an afterschool program for two years. But she wants a job in Westchester, and can’t seem to get hired. I can’t figure it out because I think she is great.

I have read that lifeguard positions are increasingly being filled by Eastern Europeans on some temporary visa scheme. The employers say it is because they can’t find people, but the article (in the NY Times) also found that black and Hispanic kids were applying and not being offered the jobs. The kids seemed to suspect that employers wanted attractive white people in the jobs.
gasstationwithoutpumps
July 6, 2012 at 12:54 pm

When I was a kid, pools paid for training their life guards. Now it seems like they expect their employees to train themselves on their own time and money. No wonder they can’t find workers! (The problem is pervasive throughout American businesses—a severe reluctance to do any on-the-job training.)
Grace
July 6, 2012 at 1:40 pm

Bonnie – I’m surprised to hear about your nanny’s challenge in finding a summer camp counselor job, but maybe those jobs are more desired than I thought. Maybe she applied too late?
Grace
July 6, 2012 at 1:45 pm

gasstation – Maybe that trend will reverse as the economy improves.

“… spending on employee development rose 9.5 percent to an average of $800 per learner in 2011, as organizations moved to combat the skills gap in the labor market….

The research found U.S. training organizations continuing on the road to recovery, following double-digit spending cuts in 2008 and 2009 with a slight uptick of 2 percent in 2010. The research also found that large business investment in social learning tools in 2011 nearly doubled to $40,000 on average. ”

http://clomedia.com/articles/view/study-organizations-spending-more-on-employee-development
Amy P
July 6, 2012 at 8:34 pm

My kids are doing Red Cross swim classes again this summer and I have been pointing out to my daughter that if she does all the courses, she could eventually work as a life guard, or maybe even a swim instructor. She loves the water, so it might be a very good fit. (It was water safety day today and she had a blast pretending to be a drowning victim.) The Red Cross also offers babysitting course for kids 11-15, I believe.

I wonder if there isn’t a socioeconomic Catch-22, where well-off kids get more pool time and lessons and are stronger swimmers but don’t have time or inclination to work, while poorer kids might want very much to life guard but haven’t had the pool time and lessons that would make them strong swimmers.
Grace
July 7, 2012 at 11:37 am

Yes, a socioeconomic Catch-22. Another type of achievement gap:

According to USA Swimming, 70% of African-American children cannot swim, compared with nearly 60% for Hispanic children and 42% for white children. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, African-American children between the ages of 5 and 14 are three times more likely to drown than white children in the same age range.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/10/us/cnnheroes-butts-josh-project/index.html
Bonnie
July 8, 2012 at 6:56 pm

$800 per learner (whatever that means) is not that great. That would pay for a 2 day workshop at the inflated prices that corporate trainers usually charge. And social learning tools? Oh dear. I remember when I was working in healthcare IT, we had to be recertified every year per the Joint Commission in basic hospital protocols. So we had this online course we had to take – it took about an hour – and most of us just filled out the test while looking at the course in another window of the computer. I’ll bet anything that the company claims that course is worth $800 per “learner”

What is really needed are real training programs that bring new people into a job. Lifeguard training, training in the company’s specfic technologies, investment in apprenticeship programs – the meaningful stuff.
Grace
July 9, 2012 at 11:00 am

While it might make a difference to increase that to $1,600 per learner or even more, the more important thing would be to improve the quality of training. I personally have had a mix of good and bad employer training, and have also probably been responsible for a mix since that was one of my responsibilities in previous employment.

I remember the best company training session I ever had was spending a week in the Bahamas to learn about carbonate (oil-producing) environments. Actually, it WAS very educational, but today it could probably be mostly accomplished by computer simulation for a much lower cost. (I wonder if geologists have cut down on the number of field trips because of technological innovations?)
Bonnie
July 9, 2012 at 12:51 pm

I think that is what I am arguing for. Good training programs would be those that either increase the ability to hire smart people who don’t have an exact match of skillsets (thus bringing new blood into a company) or to increase the skillset of people already on the job. So much of corporate training is actually peripheral to the job, like the idiotic online training program we had to complete, and yet it gets counted in that $800 per learner figure. I can remember at my earlier company, having to endure two days of training on some software system the company had acquired which I was never going to need to use. And of course there was the infamous day long session my husband had to do a couple of weeks ago on creating your social networking brand. There is a whole industry of corporate training consultants who create this claptrap, but it isn’t what is needed – what is needed is training that helps people get and hold onto their jobs.
Grace
July 10, 2012 at 7:29 am

I just read about this new unfunded mandate for NY public schools.

The Dignity for All Students Act took effect July 1 and requires schools to develop anti-bullying policies and report incidents of bullying to the state Education Department….

School employees are to receive training on cyberbullying, and the law puts the onus on schools to report and initially investigate complaints.

http://www.lohud.com/article/20120710/NEWS/307100061/Cyberbullying-law-requires-schools-investigate

I’m pretty sure I don’t think schools should be using precious resources for this training, most of which will probably be “claptrap”. Given the harsh reality of our present economics, this probably means something else will have to be cut to pay for this.
Grace
July 10, 2012 at 7:30 am

From what I read and hear, public schools are notorious for useless “teacher development” training classes.
Bonnie
July 10, 2012 at 9:16 am

Here is an excellent editorial in today’s NY Times on the “skills gap”. It is part of the Room for Debate, so there are some other editorials on this topic besides this one. As usual, though, the best parts are the comments.
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/07/09/does-a-skills-gap-contribute-to-unemployment/if-theres-a-skills-gap-blame-it-on-the-employer
Bonnie
July 10, 2012 at 9:18 am

Not just public schools – my mother taught at a private school and always complained about the useless teacher development seminars. But you know what? They were amazingly similar to the “employee development” workshops that companies make their employees attend.

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