Those of us who go way back remember Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty and Job Corps: it was supposed to offer hangout kids a way to go, even if they couldn't stay interested in school. Well, hangout kids are still with us, and Job Corps is here too, on Treasure Island and elsewhere, all over the country.

That the hangout kids are still around has ample documentation. The Center for Labor Market Studies of Northeastern University, in 2005, found that 4.4 million young people aged 16 to 24 were neither in school nor were they working. I couldn't find a more recent study, but I did find agreement that this population is still on the rise. Nobody has a great idea of what to do about it.

The National Guard has a program that will take 10,000 young people aged 16 to 24 each year for five months of schooling and a year of mentoring toward independent living.

Youthbuild USA grew in the nineties out of a group of teenagers who renovated a tenement building in Harlem. It has a mix of funding from the Labor Department, Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Agriculture, and Americorps. It also is supported by the Gates, Ford, Mott, and Home Depot Foundations. It operates a year-round training in the construction trades in Washington D.C, and weeklong institutes in various parts of the country to demonstrate to local educators and civic leaders how to replicate the original Harlem project. So far it offers nothing in northern California.

Job Corps pulls out all the stops. The New York Times' Eric Eckholm quotes the new national director, Esther R. Johnson: "Once you could go into the Job Corps, earn your General Equivalency Diploma, and go out and earn a living. You can't do that anymore." So Job Corps offers a lot more: career counseling, a daily stipend while learning, the option of living on or off campus, certification in a trade (as well as getting your G.E.D.), help with childcare if needed, job placement at the end of the training, and transition counseling for 12 months afterward. Graduates are encouraged to always stay in touch. Any legal resident aged 16-24 is eligible, and the top age limit is waived for people with disabilities.

It costs. About $26,000 per student. The national spending cap is 1.5 billion. It's a lot. Job Corps accepts 60,000 students a year. Thirty percent leave within the first two months, either because they don't like the rules or because they break them. Of the ones who stay, sixty percent leave with a G.E.D. or a high school diploma, certification in a trade, placement in a first job, and the services of a transition counselor for the next twelve months. Some are eligible for a transition stipend, depending on how well they did in the program. There is a payback to the public for all this: graduates are potentially tax-paying citizens, not welfare-dependents. The hangout kids get a second chance.

The local Job Corps Center is at Treasure Island. It prepares students to work in Word-Processing, Graphic Design, Accounting, Retail Sales, Security, Cement Masonry, Electrical, Facilities Maintenance, Painting, Plastering, and Carpentry. There are waiting lists up to three months in all areas except Carpentry. Advanced Training is offered in the Culinary Arts.

Within the first two weeks, students take a Test of Adult Basic Education. On the basis of this test, students are placed in Math, Reading, or English as a Second Language classes if needed. They are otherwise enrolled in a G.E.D. or high school diploma program. A Career Counselor is assigned, and works with the students individually to form a Career Plan. The plan begins with training, and continues with transition services. They can include an internship; they always include job placement and monitoring for a year by a counselor. Graduates are treated as alumni, and encouraged to stay in touch.

The Treasure Island Job Corps Center holds an open house once a week on Thursday mornings at 9:30 --- if you know a kid who isn't doing much, maybe a field-trip's in order...