Financial Literacy Month takes new meaning

April 17, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

Phaedra Cofield usually spends her workdays behind the scenes at U.S. Bank. But there she was, standing before 19 kindergartners, explaining the confounding truth that, despite its smaller size, a dime is worth more than a nickel.

Cofield is among the many volunteers who will participate in National Financial Literacy Month, when bankers, educators and public officials head into the community to teach Americans of all ages about money.

Declaring April to be Financial Literacy Month is nothing new, but it seems to be taken far more seriously since the financial crisis, when it became painfully clear how much many of us still needed to learn about managing money in today’s complex world.

“Preventing a recurrence will require both better behavior and oversight on Wall Street and more informed decision-making on Main Street and in homes across our country,” President Barack Obama proclaimed.

I spent the week learning about some of the ways kids are gaining financial knowledge. I can tell you, it’s not from a dull textbook.

TEACH CHILDREN TO SAVE

Cofield is one of more than 275 U.S. Bank employees who will talk to thousands of kids about spending and saving this month. In all, the bank tracked 900 school presentations in 2010. Each employee gets eight hours annually to volunteer and Cofield thought this was a good opportunity to give back.

“Why would we want to save our money?” she asked Norma Jorgensen’s class at Chelsea Heights Elementary School in St. Paul, Minn. “To buy stuff we need a lot of money for,” explained one boy. The kids got a chance to practice the concept with some pennies and a trip to Phaedra’s sticker store.

Many other financial professionals will head to classrooms this month as part of the Teach Children to Save program, one of the American Bankers Association’s contributions to Financial Literacy Month. Many other groups, including the business and personal finance education nonprofit Best Prep and the Minnesota JumpStart Coalition, have volunteers in classrooms year round.

SHOWDOWN AT CASH CANYON

The Minneapolis-based National Theatre for Children creates educational plays for kids on topics ranging from water conservation to money matters. Its new money-themed play, “Showdown at Cash Canyon,” features Sheriff Carrie Gooper, who faces a showdown with the Loose Change Gang unless she can convince the townspeople to stop spending all of their money.

Thrivent Financial for Lutherans is sponsoring its inaugural tour to 50 elementary schools in Indiana and Ohio, plus two performances at Washburn Elementary in Bloomington, Minn. During the play, elementary students learn about the purpose of money and why it should be saved.

BALANCING THE BUDGET IN BIZTOWN

The banker of BizTown has a dilemma. Every citizen was supposed to open a savings account so they wouldn’t fritter all of their paycheck away on lava lamps and popcorn. But one-third of the 92 residents never got around to it, and it was time to get back on the school bus.

BizTown is Junior Achievement’s simulated town, which students visit to put into practice what they learned in the classroom about running a business and managing a household budget.

About 13,700 Minnesota students visit the Junior Achievement facility in Maplewood, Minn., each year, where they work a job, pay household expenses and try not to overdraw their checking account.

Recently, when sixth-graders from Sanford Middle School in Minneapolis came to town, some students sold items at the gift store on the corner of Best Buy Boulevard and General Mills Street (two of the many local corporate sponsors), while others had the tough task of convincing kids to pay money to use the Wellness Center. They elected a mayor and even had a lawyer there in litigation about a slip-and-fall accident at the local diner.

In addition to BizTown, which is designed for fourth- to sixth-graders, Junior Achievement runs a financial-literacy program focused town for seventh- and eighth-graders called JA Finance Park. The nonprofit also offers online and classroom materials for students who can’t make it to Maplewood.

Classroom materials abound, but are no replacement for these unique experiences. “Experiential learning really is very, very effective,” said Catherine Solheim, an associate professor at the University of Minnesota who studies personal-finance education. “Finding things that relate to where kids are at that particular developmental stage is really important.”

Kara McGuire is a columnist for the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. Readers may send her email at kmcguirestartribune.com or follow her on Twitter kablog.

2011, Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

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