St. Paul recorder., 1963-12-05
MONITOR
HORIZONS

HORIZONS
Editors Note: This article is
the second of several which will
be written by the Monitors club
purely for public information and
to further acquaint our youth
with the growing OccupatiOnaI
opportunities and the need to
finish their education to meet
these new careers.
'UNWANTED"
Compared to high school grad
uates, dropouts suffer greater un-
employment, take longer to find
jobs, get pooer jobs and earn less
money. Unframed and incompletely
educated, they are often under
employed, face the prospects of
lifetime of blind alley jobs, and
sometimes remain permanently un-
employed, except for part-time and
odd jobs. They are unnecessary
and are unwanted in the work
force.
Negroes and other minority
group members are sometimes
arbitrarily excluded from many
training and employment oppor-
tunities. The inequality of oppor-
tunity is seen in lower incomes
and poverty, poor housing and
shum neighborhoods and lower lev
els of education and skill. A study
in one Pennsylvania city makes a
point: Negro college graduates
earn only five cents an hour more
than Negroes with an elementary
school education, whereas Negro
college graduates earn seven cents
an hour less than white Protest
ants with only an elementary
school education.
Determinations strike even
deeper in a personal sense. Aware
of the barriers to employment,
many minority group youngsters
are reluctant to enroll in available
training courses. Thus when op-
portunities for us do in fact open
up, we are unprepared with the
skills needed to be hired. In giving
up in the first place, we become
victims of a vicious circle, and
many of us lose our desire to i'm
prove our situation.
Another especially disadvant-
aged group are those who migrate
to the big cities from rural areas,
many of whom are Negroes and
dropouts. Unprepared for both city
life and work, we founder for a
long time and many of us never
really find ourselves.
Some of the dropouts, in mi
grants and minority youth might
possibly be marginally employable
regardless of the state of the econ
omy, but the premium automation
has put on training underscores
the urgency of reaching these
youngsters and motivating them
toward work and training. Studies
of drop-outs reveal that 70 per cent
have at least average intelligence
and are capable of completing high
school. From 6 to 13 per cent are
smart enough to do college work.
But we are victims of economic,
social, cultural and psychological
pressures which we have not been
able to cope with alone. We are re-
jecting a situation that we feel has
rejected us.
The problem of our nearly one
million unemployed youth is a for
midable one, but it may be rela-
lively minor in size compared to
what is ahead of us in the future.
There is reason to question the
wisdom of a policy that urges
their return to the classroom be-
fore our schools have been streng-
thened sufficiently to attract them
and deal more effectively with
their special needs.
We have the wisdom and re-
sources to lick this problem. We
unlocked the secrets Of the atom
and are currently putting a man
into space. Surely we could come
up with a crash program and
find the way to train and employ