<p>I can see a bit of depression with these kids too or they are just burned out. I find we expect so much of teenagers and young adults these days. Sure many of our kids never worked in high school. How could they when the played sports or instruments, volunteered many hours and all the other ECs they needed to get into college. The pressure to succeed is so intense. The economy is in the tank and for many they don’t see it getting any better. For some people the competition for jobs is too much for them to even try. Now on the other hand they could be just plain lazy. Think about how much harder it is to work 40 hours a work doing something extemely boring.</p>
<p>Xiggi, I believe I was the parent who coined the phrase Love the Kid on Couch. I did not mean “let your kid watch Simpson’s reruns all summer” even though that’s what many posters have concluded that this was my meaning- and this is certainly what my kid on the couch wanted to do with his free time. I meant, “Accept the fact that you may not have spawned the kid who will wake up at 5 am every day to take three buses to get to the lab where he’s working to cure cancer before heading off to his cello lesson”.</p>
<p>My kids were expected to either work for money or to better society every summer once they started HS. The jobs they held were often smelly or disgusting or both; some paid very little especially when transportation was factored in (bike riding to work became a god- send since it was free!) They didn’t need to be working every minute- down time is fine- and they didn’t need to be doing something resume building. They also needed time for their friends, visiting grandma, etc.</p>
<p>But I see a fundamental disconnect from some of the posters here bemoaning how stressed out our kids are as a reason for why they can’t work during the summer (or why they need down time after graduating.) </p>
<p>For any kid who is getting the advice to take the “babysitting, lifeguard, house painter, dogwalker” jobs off the resume- my suggestion is to consolidate all of those jobs into one resume entry:
Jack of All Trades- Summers of 2008-2012
Worked as an Independent Contractor in a wide range of roles ranging from food service to childcare/home improvement</p>
<p>You don’t need 5 resume entries to show you’ve got spunk and initiative, but there is certainly an acceptable way to indicate that spunk and initiative on a professional resume.</p>
<p>This is not about pressure to succeed or competition for full time jobs being too intense. It’s common sense- “I am 22 years old. I have a degree in French Literature (or economics or anthropology from XYZ college) and have a good work ethic and experience trading my leisure time for money. hire me”.</p>
<p>A young adult who has worked a dozen different jobs or more will not put everything on the resume. Usually by the time a student is out of college, the high school jobs will be dropped – assuming there are more interesting, career related jobs and internships to list from the college years.</p>
<p>But the point is that the kid with high school work experience has a resume to present when looking for those more interesting jobs & internships, and they are also competitive. </p>
<p>You can argue that in high school the kid can’t work because they are too busy & overstressed with their multiple APs & EC’s, and in college they can’t work during the school year because they need to worry about their GPAs, and they can’t work during the summers because the jobs and internships are so hard to find… </p>
<p>but my kids didn’t have that luxury, because I am a single parent with a moderate income and my kids don’t have trust funds. Their dad’s finances are worse than mine – one of my biggest fears is that they are going to find they are burdened with supporting their dad in his old age, because he has nothing put away for retirement. My son is not yet 30 and already in the position of being a single father. </p>
<p>I felt that part of my responsibility as a parent was to raise two kids who would have been capable of supporting themselves upon high school graduation at age 18. Of course, had they not gone to college, then whatever job they could have gotten would have been marginal. But to me, the purpose of the education is to enhance the career prospects and earning capacity of someone who already is capable of earning money… not to defer entry into the labor market for 4 or more years while the person racks up credentials in an effort to skip ahead to the good stuff in terms of salary and working conditions. </p>
<p>Maybe the equation is different to the kids whose parents have amassed or inherited enough wealth that the parents really don’t have to worry about how their kid is going to survive if and when the parent isn’t there to provide. To me, it’s not an issue of “passing judgment” on someone else, it’s simply was a matter of encouraging my kids to lay a foundation for their own future.</p>
<p>There wouldn’t have been college for either of them if they hadn’t worked. I didn’t have the money to pay full freight; their college financial aid packages were premised on a self-help expectation that I couldn’t fill for therm. And if I hadn’t seen that both were capable of handling a part-time job while in school during their high school years, I think I would have been very nervous sending them off to faraway colleges where they would need to maintain work-study jobs to meet day-to-day expenses.</p>
<p>My 2009 graduate just called to say she has her first teaching job. She worked as a sub for two years, supplementing with Walmart and the local Y, and summers at a church camp. This year she’s been fulltime at a private school that hasn’t paid her since the end of March, and living off of her savings. She managed to save quite a bit, with very frugal living.</p>
<p>FINALLY - a public school job, with health insurance and a pension. Actually, the job also provides a house and utilities - on the shores of the Bering Strait.</p>
<p>BS.SD? Interesting name, but it could have been even more interesting if Sarah Palin School District had been available. Lots of Seeing Russia and Little Diomede on the program!</p>
<p>The parents are enablers plain and simple. Only rather than enabling a lifestyle of drugs they are allowing a detrimental lifestyle of being an adult that doesn’t work and lives off of others. I have an aunt that does the same thing for her daughter. My aunt spent nearly 150k to put the girl through a dance degree that she “was passionate about”. This girl believes she is god’s gift to the earth and has been mooching off her parents even after graduating 2 years ago. She has never had a job and she is 24 years old now. After graduating she moved back home and continues to go to "gigs’ that pay almost nothing. Her parents pay for her car, housing, food and everything else since last year she only earned a few thousand dollars. </p>
<p>This behavior will likely continue since her dad and mom are bad parents.</p>
<p>Are people finding a widespread requirement that volunteers be at least age 18? Maybe it’s regional. We are in the NYC area, and we do find that a lot – certainly at the hospital, and even at the local animal shelter.</p>
<p>There can also be some tension between the lower-paid staff and the volunteers. (I’m thinking of an experience an adult friend had, volunteering at a library.) Staff don’t always like someone coming in for free to pitch in on the tasks they do for pay.</p>
<p>I think volunteering is great, but it’s not as readily available, particularly to high schoolers, as it may have been in the past.</p>
<p>Personally speaking, I think businesses are really taking advantage of entry level workers. They call them “interns” if they don’t call them “volunteers”. I’ve seen tons of job listings these days that say, “intern-to-part time”. What’s with that? The businesses want to get free labor, instead of making a paid commitment. And no, these interns are college graduates, so there isn’t any “college credit” stipulation involved.</p>
<p>Around here, the regional food bank will accept volunteers 16 and up without an adult. Under age 16, you must have an adult present. Ours is a great way to get hours because you can volunteer 9-12 and/or 1-4 Monday - Saturday, plus 2-3 hours on Thursday nights. They’re also used to working with teenagers.</p>
<p>Hospitals still have programs allowing teen volunteers.</p>
<p>My daughter also found some small occasion/small hour volunteer opportunities related to her interests – ushering at dance performances, working at the ballet boutique during performances, etc.</p>
<p>My son volunteered at the local hospital at age 16. (His was an easy gig… literally. He played piano in the lobby.) There was some minimal volunteer training and I think also a TB test.</p>
<p>Son’s group hired a bunch of paid interns for the summer. They range from high-school students to college seniors. The college students are from public universities and the high-school students aren’t from highly regarded districts. He doesn’t know what the hiring process was. Some of the interns don’t have majors related to the work and are being trained.</p>
<p>I’m pretty happy that they are being trained as I generally don’t like the concept of unpaid interns.</p>
<p><volunteering under="" age="" 18?="">
In our area, many high school kids volunteer at hospitals. Some museums also accept volunteers under 18. Animal shelters are over 18 only. I think it’s a matter of public health, or they just have enough help from adult animal lovers.</volunteering></p>
<p><the trend="" of="" making="" unpaid="" interns="" do="" what="" were="" once="" paid="" jobs="" seems="" like="" a="" massive="" department="" labor="" issue=""> I’ve heard, for example, that a job of pharmacy technician is now hard to come by, because of unpaid interns.</the></p>
<p>The entire unpaid internships thing is at the least a department of labor issue, if not out right criminal to these kids.
My kid is one of 86 applicants for an unpaid internship, the minimum requirement for consideration is a BS in engineering. Alongside that, 2+ years of work experience. HUH? Work for free for 3 months, this work is seasonal in this country, and overseas after the 3 months. I will bet my last penny, the 3 months ends, they cut EVERY SINGLE kid and go overseas and do it all over again. </p>
<p>My kid has sent out and applied to over 200 entry level ANYTHING, contacted anyone we knew that perhaps could pass on her resume. NOT ONE email/response nothing.</p>
<p>The APPLE retail store didn’t even acknowledge the application for part time stock person. Funny thing about the APPLE retail job, she knows 40 kids her age that applied for the same APPLE retail job. All just graduated. </p>
<p>The 7 -eleven window in my neighborhood has 7 fliers posted, handyman/babysitting/tutoring services offered. I know every one of the 7 kids who have posted the fliers. All recent graduates. </p>
<p>I hear the kids that are getting their actual diplomas in the mail have figured out per square inch what the piece of heavy gauge piece of paper cost them. Anywhere from 600 per square inch to 1100 a square inch.</p>
<p>The June jobs report came out this morning: 80,000 net job gains: 14K manufacturing, 47K professional and services, 15.1K restaurants and bars. Retailers cut 5.4K jobs and government cut 4K jobs.</p>
<p>Given the number of people looking for jobs, these numbers are inadequate.</p>
<p>Interns have living and other expenses and companies using unpaid interns are just draining their resources. Perhaps they get some experience or perhaps not. At any rate, it seems like legal theft to me.</p>
<p>If these tales don’t illuminate the folly of making college decisions based on expected income and employment opportunities at graduation, I don’t know what would. </p>
<p>Not to mention the foolishness of amassing large amounts of student debt with the expectations that the income will be there to service it.</p>