The job market. The phrase brings to mind images of adults armed with credentials looking for full-time, important jobs, or fresh college graduates entering the grown-up world with newly minted degrees.

Not such a common image is the sophomore in high school who needs money for insurance, gas and piano lessons, staring nervously out at a big broad world with only a vague notion that she doesn't want to end up flipping burgers at a fast-food place.

Celeste Lavin understands. She's been there. While she was looking for a summer job last year, Celeste, then a 16-year-old sophomore, now a 17-year-old junior at Lower Merion High School in Philadelphia, found herself frustrated, discouraged and without resources.

She'd go into stores that were hiring, only to find out that they only wanted teens 18 and older. And that's when she could find stores that were hiring teens at all. It wasn't just her problem -- friends and her older brother had had trouble finding part-time jobs in the past.

While job advice and listings exist, Celeste said, they tend to be spread around in bits and pieces, or made for adults. "There's monster.com for adults," she said, "but we're specifically talking about your first experience in front of a boss."

It was hard to find out what businesses were hiring workers, and what the requirements for those workers were. Frustrated, she thought, "Isn't there something that can just tell me where the jobs are?" Then another thought occurred to her: "Maybe I should just make it."

She called her older brother, Austin, 23, for help, telling him, "I just think this is something that really needs to happen."

The "something" turned out to be www.MyFirstPaycheck.com, a Web site that lists job openings specifically for teens and provides access to tips on what teens should do to get the jobs they're looking for, and keep them. Celeste is co-founder and chief marketing officer.

"It's one location; you just go to one place," she said. "We just want to present something readable."

"We designed it, wrote all the material, went door to door to collect job listings from employers," she said. Some friends helped with programming and technical aspects, but most of the work was done by Celeste and her brother.

The moment it hit her that it was actually real, Celeste said, was when they were sitting down with a programmer friend, who was explaining about what they would click to go "live" on the Internet. "I was like, `Oh my, it's going live!"' she said. "`It's actually going to be on the Internet; it's not just in my head anymore!"'

MyFirstPaycheck originally listed job openings only in the Philly area, but now it has expanded to include listings from Washington, D.C., and New York City. Celeste said they hope to keep growing, but slowly. "It's growing; we're figuring out how to make it self-sustaining, so we don't have to go out every other weekend to get job listings from employers," she said.

People in other regions have noticed the service, too. Occasionally, she said, they get inquiries from employers elsewhere who want to post their job openings, or they receive desperate e-mails from teens saying, "Find me a job!"

"Right now we're trying to stabilize what we have," Celeste said, "but hopefully, we'll be ready soon enough to alleviate their stress in finding a job."

Meanwhile, as MyFirstPaycheck continues to expand its circle, it offers plenty of helpful services for teen job seekers in any part of the country. For instance, the handy Resume Builder, a sample resume generator, won't provide you with an official document, but it will give you a good guideline.

"Everyone knows what activities they've done," Celeste said, referring to the creation of a resume, "but this just puts it in a format."

The Web site also has a job survey you can fill out, and you can read the results of others' surveys. It offers "how-to" advice on resumes, interviews, cover letters, and keeping a job once you land it.

So did Celeste get a job after all that research? "People always ask me that!" she said with a laugh. "This is my job now. I have no time for another job with six hours of school a day! That kind of gets in the way."

Helping run the Web site is worthwhile, she said. "It feels great. The best feeling is when someone in my own grade who I don't know very well comes up to me and goes, `Oh, my gosh, I got that job, thanks to you!"'

"I'm just glad I can make this not such a terrible experience in my peers' lives," Celeste said.

MyFirstPaycheck.com arms teens with useful information that can give them confidence and encourage them to believe that they, too, like adults and college graduates, can hold their own in the sometimes-overwhelming world of employment, so that they end up happily employed in the jobs that are right for them.