As college admission figures continue to drop, there are more high school graduates looking for the best jobs that don’t require a higher education degree. What companies are offering them the best opportunities?
Chipotle, Lowe’s and Walgreens offer them the best options for hiring and for quick promotions, according to a new analysis by the American Opportunity Index.
According to the index, this year some 40% of this year’s high school graduates don’t plan to enroll in college. Some want to increase their savings before going back to school, and others may decide not to pursue a college degree at all.
The data in the American Opportunity Index was compiled by pulling from various labor-market data sources, like public LinkedIn profiles and Indeed resumes. They tracked nearly five million workers over five years and used that data to determine which companies are likeliest to hire and promote entry-level workers and which companies best prepare those workers for better jobs elsewhere.
Rajiv Chandrasekaran, a managing director at the Schultz Family Foundation, one of the groups behind the index, notes that while there is plenty of data to offer guidance to college graduates, there is very little to help this demographic make their decisions upon graduating high school. He says, “Where they choose to get that first job matters.”
The top 50 best large firms for high school graduates are as much as 4.3 times likelier to hire people out of high school than America’s other big companies, the index found.
Workers with high school degrees are also as much as 2.5 times more likely to get promoted — defined as a role change with a pay bump of 10% or more — at these companies.
Retailers are far likelier than other types of companies to have available roles for high school graduates. They comprise 20 of the top 50 companies. But banks and insurance companies are also well represented.
PNC Bank, which reaches out to high schools to fill entry-level roles and offers skills and interview training, is number 5. M&T Bank and State Farm are also on the list, among others.
However, while retailing is one of the most fertile sectors for high school graduates and the opportunities are there, pay is low compared to other industries and quit rates are high as employees get fed up with dealing with theft and rude customers, Bloomberg reports.
The index itself is a joint project of the Schultz Family Foundation, Harvard’s Managing the Future of Work Project and the Burning Glass Institute.
