Working Class : What should a new high school graduate expect from the job market? It's not a pretty picture. Many will be lucky to find a low-paying, part-time job.

By MICHAEL QUINTANILLA

June 17, 1994 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Jose Garcia, who will graduate from high school in two weeks, is worn out from day-and-night party hopping.

But rather than grad-month celebrations, the parties are birthday bashes for kids. Garcia, 18, has a job setting up and taking down Jungle Jumps, those bouncy, house-sized balloon tents. He keeps the kids jumping, and vice-versa.

One recent Saturday, exhausted from a 16-hour workday, Garcia finally hit his pillow only to experience a new, sleep-stealing form of graduation Angst : Come June 30, a day after he receives his diploma from Garfield High in East Los Angeles, Garcia won’t head off to college. Instead, he’ll be clocking in even more hours at the Hollywood company where his job enables him to help pay the rent and buy groceries for himself, his parents and two sisters. And he knows he’s lucky to have it.

As some 27,663 Los Angeles Unified School District seniors--and tens of thousands more at other Southern California high schools--graduate this month, many will move directly to two- or four-year colleges.

But others will postpone college--or skip it altogether--and try to find full-time work. And the opportunities in factories or civil service that might have been open to high school grads a generation ago are severely limited. Although the Los Angeles school district does not keep complete records on how many students go on to college, the U.S. Census Bureau reports that 42% of 1992’s high school graduates did so.

High school career counselors report that most seniors will find low-paying, part-time jobs, most in the fast-food and retail industries. Many of the jobs come without benefits; wages range from $4.25 an hour to as high as $10 an hour for a lucky few.

But the students pounding the pavement might consider themselves fortunate to get hired at all in a Southland economy that can be cruel to job-seeking youth.

California’s youth unemployment rate, always two to three times the overall jobless figure, is at a five-year high, according to state figures. The unemployment rate for 16- to 19-year-olds was 24% in April; during the summer, the rate usually goes up another three to five percentage points.

You don’t have to tell Los Angeles-area graduating seniors that the job picture is gloomy--they know.

Many of their parents are out of work. Seniors who graduated last year have lost their jobs or have had to compete for positions with older, more experienced adults. And this year’s senior class has seen college graduates return home unable to get work using their degrees.

Jim Konantz, career development director for the LAUSD, said graduating seniors who aren’t college bound should concentrate on job training.

“Employment is not good right now. The best thing for high school graduates not opting for college is to enroll in job-training programs in the high-tech, business technology, health care or travel and tourism industries.”

“Nowadays, (good) jobs require more skills,” he said, citing that labor statistics show that high school graduates will change jobs five or six times in their careers. “You can’t go to General Motors and work there for 30 years,” he said. “Those days are gone.”

Bernadette Corsey-Graham, who directs First Break, a districtwide job development program for senior high, adult and continuation schools, said the need for graduating seniors to work has increased each of the last three years.

“Across the board, it doesn’t matter if you are an inner-city kid or a Valley kid, more and more graduates have a parent who has been laid off or is unemployed. Jobs are no longer a luxury. Jobs are a necessity for young people who have to help support their family,” she said.

“That’s a reality to postponing college,” she added. “To get work is to survive.”

That’s all John Davis, 18, is trying to do.

Two weeks ago, Davis, who lives alone and is self-supporting, was laid off from his $5-an-hour after-school job at the Federal Aviation Administration, where he handled data entry and office work.

For a while he juggled two jobs so he could afford his rent, food and utilities after his mother moved to New Orleans five months ago. Davis said he chose to say in Los Angeles because he didn’t want to leave Locke High School in South-Central Los Angeles and figured he could take care of himself.

Davis, who graduated Wednesday, said he can survive for one month on his savings.

“I don’t want to file for unemployment, that’s not my style,” he said. “It was my decision to live alone. My mother said, ‘Fine, you’ve got a job and I believe you can make it on your own.’ But I didn’t think I would lose my job.”

Still, Davis remains undaunted.

With his diploma in hand and a positive attitude, he said: “Right now is not a time to be picky. I’m willing to flip burgers because I’ve got to survive.”

At 14, Davis earned his first few dollars mowing a yard. He’s worked as a junior lifeguard, a cook, an assistant manager, a cashier and has experience in retail merchandising.

He thought about going to college in the evenings while he worked during the day, but not now, not since he’s out of a job.

“I can’t go to college right away,” he said. “I don’t feel comfortable with my decision, but I have to deal with it. I have to pay rent. If I get a job that I’m real comfortable with and that I can keep for a long time, I’ll go to school in the evenings and take up a trade like electronics.

“That’s how it is when you have to survive on your own. You just get used to it. You do what you have to do, even if it means delaying college.”

Eryn Lewin, an 18-year-old Birmingham High School student who graduated Thursday, just wants to land a job--any job.

Even though her mother would rather she go to college, Lewin said she’ll postpone her dream of teaching kindergarten for a bit. For now, she just wants a break from school.

“My mother says if I don’t go to college I’m not going to get anywhere in the future. I told her that everybody in this world did not go to college and that there are people who are graduating from places like Harvard and Berkeley and they can barely find a job themselves.

“I don’t want to go to college and not be guaranteed a job afterward. For me, that’s a lot of money down the drain to only end up working at McDonald’s, which is where I could get a job now without college.”

But even a gig serving up french fries seems distant.

“The job market looks bad for me. It’s horrible out there,” she said, adding that she’s applied for jobs at an area mall but hasn’t received any callbacks.

For some, the military is an appealing option. Kristina Sneider, 18, also a Birmingham High graduate, said she’s not waiting to be rejected by prospective employers. By summer’s end she’ll begin a two-year Marine Corps stint.

Until then, she’ll keep her part-time weekend job as a restaurant hostess because “I need to help out my mom.”

At the start of her senior year, Sneider was set to go to the University of Arizona. But just a few months ago she changed her mind after a Marine recruiter came to her school.

She said the military experience “will make me a stronger person, more disciplined, more well-rounded. I need that, especially now that I’m going to be out there in the world and out of this little high school.”

Her mother thinks it’s a pretty good idea, Sneider said. “I’m glad for that. The rest of my family was all set on me going to college for four years, then law school . . . and well, that’s not how it’s gonna be. They think my plan is radical. What? The Marines? Are you crazy?”

No, she tells them. “I’m just being practical. I don’t want a dead-end job.”

Neither does Garcia, but for the time being, he’s happy to remain at his job setting up Jungle Jumps until better opportunities materialize.

He would like to go to college, but must put it off to help support his family. His father, a furniture finisher, worked regularly until three years ago when he had heart surgery.

“My dad’s been suffering for a lot of years,” said Garcia, who has worked every summer and after school since he was 12 in construction, plumbing, painting and alongside his dad, making $6 an hour as a furniture finisher.

“My parents have helped me out all my life. They struggled and sacrificed a lot for me. And now, I just want to return the favor,” he said.

He said that when people learn that he’s not going to college, “they probably think that I’m gonna be lazy the rest of my life. I want those people to know that sometimes it’s very different for other kids.

“I want people to know that I’m a hard worker, that I’m not a gangbanger, that I’m not lazy. Later on, I’ll get some college, but for now I’m just trying to live a normal life by working for a living.”