Options include back to school, test tough job market

Another wave of new graduates might be ready for the real world, but the feeling isn't mutual. The job market morass continues to delay or detour many of their dreams. In an informal
R-J survey, 68 new college and high school grads revealed a mix of anxiety, anger and fatalistic optimism about the future.

For Hunter Smit, newly graduated from UNLV's William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration with a degree in beverage management, the only definite plan is a yearlong chill in Los Angeles, "relaxing and having fun" with friends.

"With the economy in the dumps," Smit said, "I don't feel like chasing after a full-time job in my field when there's 9,000 other people doing that."

Smit earned enough as a cabana host at The Venetian to afford a Las Vegas house whose renters pay its mortgage. So, at age 23, he said he has plenty of future left to work toward his dream of owning a chain of microbreweries.

"No matter what, there's always going to be people spending money," he said. "No matter what, there's going to be a way."

Melody Evans, 49, thought she had retired from hotel management, where she spent 15 unfulfilling years before entering the College of Southern Nevada's radiation therapy program two years ago.

Now that she has graduated and passed her boards, there's "nothing out there," Evans said.

"I'm upset," she added. "I got into this field because I really wanted to care for people who have cancer."

Evans -- who blames employer uncertainty about President Obama's health care plan -- is looking for a new job in her old field.

"It's just very frustrating," she said.

When New Jersey native Brian Benitz entered the University of Nevada, Las Vegas hotel college in 2005, the future looked as rosy as the frontage of a five-star Strip property.

"I figured we could pretty much write our own ticket and do whatever," he said.

Benitz, 28, had planned to graduate last year, but the opportunity to take an internship full time presented itself and he ditched school to seize it.

"Because there were so few jobs, I couldn't say no," he said.

The event-planning company that hired Benitz as a production manager went belly-up last year. But not before it gave him the opportunity to repeatedly hire a drapery rental outfit grateful for the work. Benitz -- who completed the two classes he needed to graduate this past semester -- is up for a position with Quest Drape in Denver, Seattle or Washington, D.C.

"We always used to joke around about how hard it is to find good people in Vegas," Benitz said. "So I went back there and asked if they were hiring."

Benitz said he is one of the few UNLV hotel management graduates he knows with any solid prospects.

"It was kind of a depressing day when I graduated, because nobody had jobs, so everyone was kind of stressed out," he said. "The degree's not enough. It's experience and references and paying your dues."

Jessica Magnes, 32, jokes that the skills she learned from CSN's two-year human resources management program are marketable because there are still people left in the job market to fire.

"Or hire," she said, laughing, "in some cases."

"I'm not freaking out as much as I should be, probably," Magnes said, admitting that she hasn't launched her job search yet. "But my job skills are valuable. I could do retail, food, all kinds of stuff."

The R-J also surveyed 27 new high school graduates from Bonanza, Bishop Gorman and Advanced Technologies Academy. All who agreed to be interviewed said they were headed directly to college or the military, and that none of their schooling or career decisions so far was affected by the economy.

"I'm glad I'm still in school, because the job opportunities are a bit on the short side," said Bishop Gorman valedictorian Matt Rillera, 18, who plans to study computer science at Stanford come the fall.

"But I have confidence that the economy will get better as time goes on."

Contact reporter Corey Levitan at clevitan@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0456.