Ep 112 | Financial literacy: Setting up kids for stable futures

SPEAKER_02 0:00

I had one student that I was like, Miss Causey, I like this game because I learned that you shouldn't pay your bills with credit. And I'm like, oh, that's a great lesson. Nice job, Johnny. Nice job. That is a good takeaway.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

Welcome to the Voices United in Education podcast. Each week we showcase the teachers, administrators, and community members who go the extra mile to contribute to the success of every student in Escambi County. You'll meet the real people behind the titles and learn about the amazing resources to support every student's success. To many adults, money is a mystery. It's the taboo thing we all think about but don't talk about. We're too embarrassed to go back to the basics and too proud to tell our kids, I don't know. My next guest is working to end this cycle by not just educating kids on money management basics, but making growing it accessible and fun. She's a social studies teacher at Pine Forest High School whose econ class includes a mock investing challenge contest. Two of her students placed second and third in our area winning Amazon gift cards, but more importantly, setting them up to break the cycle of poverty in the panhandle. Today she's going to share what motivates her to dig in when others bypass and where to start if you're feeling behind. Teaching financial literacy and setting up kids for stable futures, Navy helicopter mechanic to teacher Jennifer Cossey. Thanks for doing this. Thank you for having me. So money is such a loaded topic. I feel like, I feel like it's the most emotionally charged math that ever was. What's your personal motivation to not just teach the minimal required, you know, personal finance to these kids? Why take it to the next level?

SPEAKER_02 1:54

When I was growing up, my family didn't have a lot of money, and my parents weren't probably the most financially literate as far as like investing how to grow the money they had. They just did their best to try to save as much as they could and in budget. But those are those are great things, but those those are not all the tools you need to get out of poverty. So my biggest motivation is really to give kids those tools that they might not otherwise have access to.

SPEAKER_01 2:21

Yeah, I love that. The required financial literacy education in school is a recent thing. Since parents listening probably didn't have it, can you just paint a picture of what that looks like in the classroom?

SPEAKER_02 2:33

So my class is economics, but it's economics and financial literacy. So uh it's kind of both melted into one. So they learn their basic economics curriculum about, you know, what the Fed is, supply and demand, stuff like that. But I try my best to put financial literacy into those topics. So we'll do some financial literacy type stuff that's related to the the economic standards about whatever topic we're doing. But we also on the side, we have two things that we do through the uh Florida Council on Economic Education, the FCE. We do the budget game where every week they play through a month. There's 18 months total in the game, and they play through a month of a simulator of them managing a credit card, a banking account. They get paid, they have expenses, they have to make life choices, and they have to like try to boost their credit score while maintaining a decent quality of life. So it I feel like it's pretty realistic for them and they enjoy it. It's pretty fun. So that's what they they do kind of on downtime in class when they have nothing else to do. And every week they do a month and they just roll through the game and they reflect on their choices every week.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

I have a follow-up question because that is like so cool to me and so nerdy but exciting at the same time. Yes. So is each student individually playing this game or are they in groups? They're individually playing the game. Interesting. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 3:52

Yes. They all have their own account. So they all play it on their own and they make their own choices. And you know, we have some kids that that do really well. And there's some kids that at least they're learning this stuff in simulator. They learn, oh, if I max out my credit card, my bill is very expensive.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

Like so what's their what's their outlook on money before and after playing this game? Because, you know, a lot of kids don't have a concept of what things cost, for example. Do you, as the teacher, can you see the transformation of like the life around them outside the game starting to click? Like, oh, mom and dad paid for groceries. Groceries were $230. Like, is that clicking?

SPEAKER_02 4:28

Um, yeah. So I do think that there is a bit of a uh a connection that's made there. In the beginning, you know, they're, oh, how do I pay my bills? Like, because they don't come out out automatic in the game. Like they have to keep on track of it of when things are due and when statements come out. And then they're like, oh, you know, it's uh I should probably put stuff in my savings and I teach them to put at least 10%, if not more. So a lot of times they'll they'll they'll start trying to put more money out of their uh bank account and really scroll it away. Uh and then a lot of I had one student that was like, Miss Causey, I like this game because I learned that you shouldn't pay your bills with credit. And I'm like, that's a great lesson. Nice job, Johnny.

SPEAKER_00 5:04

Nice job.

SPEAKER_01 5:05

That is a good takeaway. Oh my gosh. Has it translated into their real lives? I'm not sure if any of the kids have like sign jobs. Oh, a lot.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Most of them do work. So yeah, I think it has translated. It helps them be more savings-minded. Like I teach them to pay yourself first. When as soon as they get a paycheck every week in the game, every uh every not every school week, but every week that goes by in the game. So they get about four paychecks every week because we do a month at a time. And I tell uh I kind of teach them, hey, well, as soon as that paycheck hits, put it in a little bit in your savings. And and they see it build up. And I think it's like satisfying for them to see their stuff build up and then you know their their credit score slowly go up. Because I tell them like you need at least a 700 to generally to buy a house. So if you're in that set you get to that 700 territory, you're doing good. If you're low, you know, you need you got you gotta be doing good things.

SPEAKER_01 5:52

Interesting. So I love that from a psychological point of view that you're showing kids in a game. Yes. Okay, you're literally winning with money. And then they can, because as you said, they have the side hustles that they do, whether it's washing cars or babysitting, that they're able to win with money in real life. So they're equating it with this winning of of a game and to winning in their actual lives. That's super cool.

SPEAKER_02 6:19

I love being able to teach them that in a game because I didn't get a game to learn that when I was younger, which I which is true for most millennials that they learn through misadventures in credit. Um maxing out credit cards and figuring out, whoa, this bill is crazy. Like, oh, it takes me years to pay this bill off. So I love being able to teach them these things in a safe environment where they're not actually messing up their actual credit.

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Yeah, yeah. Because learning compounding interests in real life as a young adult, making minimum wage is not a fun activity.

SPEAKER_02 6:50

And then the second part of it is also through the FCE, we play the stock market challenge, and that's the mock investing contest. That's the one that you were talking about earlier, where they I have this year, I had them do it individually, but this upcoming school year, I'm gonna do it in groups so they can kind of we can they can have more of a collaborative process where they like decide the investments together among their groups. But they manage a a hundred thousand dollar fake portfolio, but you're investing in real stocks that have real-time prices. And I teach them about the one of the first things is Ms. Causey's golden rule investing is scared money, don't make no money. I'm like, that's the first thing you need to know. If you're super face safe with your investments, you're not gonna grow. I'm like, well, how do we take risks without losing all of our money? Like, that's like the first quick, like one of the first days of class when it was I start talking about investing. How do you take risks and not lose everything? And I'm like, there's something we learn about at the end of the class called diversification where you spread your investments out. So I introduced that in the beginning of the class, like, you know, you're gonna you're gonna learn how to spread your investments out to balance your risk. So the whole time when we're doing the stock market challenge, they're competing against all of the other students in the state that are doing it, it's K through 12 contest. But they're also there's regional winners, which was my two winners were for the Panhandle region, and then there's the entire state. So they they get they can get cash prizes on either level. They can either get you know the regional cash prize or the state cash prize. So they're playing against each other at the school, and then they're playing against the entire state, and they can see the leaderboard in real time. And it's like you gotta diversify your portfolio because if you put too much in one thing, you'll you'll get disqualified. How many schools have this? Not every school plays. I'm not sure how many schools, it's a lot of schools, it's it's through all throughout the state. I I have I haven't actually looked that up, but it is it is pretty popular. Like it's it's throughout the state, like it's it's all over the place. I'd probably say a few thousand schools are playing easily. Like it's elementary, it's middle, it's high school, it's all levels. Wow. There's homeschool as well. Homeschooling students will also be in it as well, so it's not just public schools.

SPEAKER_01 8:54

Is it a a cloud-based program or like how are they accessing all this? Because you said real-time stocks, real time, real stocks and when and real prices of the stocks. So is it is it like a cloud platform or how how are they accessing this? How are they playing?

SPEAKER_02 9:12

Um, I'm pretty sure it is a cloud because it's it saves it all.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 9:16

So like they can access their account anytime and they can see, you know, their their portfolio went down. There's like a five, like roughly maybe a five minute delay, like a few minutes between the actual real stock market, but um they'll they'll be able to access it at any time and it remembers their moves and everything like that. So I'd say it's cloud-based.

SPEAKER_01 9:31

Can they view it from their tablets or their phones?

SPEAKER_02 9:33

Yeah, they can log in anywhere.

SPEAKER_01 9:34

I am cracking up at the idea of teenagers instead of looking at TikTok, they're checking their pretend stocks.

SPEAKER_02 9:42

Yeah, I had some students that were really into it. So it was pretty cool to see them like, like, oh, look, my NVIDIA is going up, like, oh, you know, like they're really excited. It was cool. It was really cool. And then at the end of the school year, I had a few students like, Miss Cosie, I just downloaded Robin Hood. I'm I'm I'm investing. Oh, that's cool, that's cool. But it was really cool to see a lot of these students like, oh, I just bought some Bitcoin. Like, oh, that's really cool.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

Like, I'm glad I inspired you. Wow, that's amazing. What's the parents' response to all of this?

SPEAKER_02 10:10

I feel like it's been pretty positive. One of the one of the students was telling me how her mom thought it was like the coolest thing in the world that that they were learning about all this stuff, learning about bank accounts, they're learning about investing. Like, I I love I love hearing that feedback.

SPEAKER_01 10:23

What role do you think technology plays in students' grasp of money reality? Because on the one hand, technology can cause us to be disassociative, right? Because we look at people online and we don't always see them as real people. But on the other hand, it can like I could look at my bank account right now. I could look at my investments right now. So what how do you see that?

SPEAKER_02 10:48

I think it's really relevant because nowadays and in 21st century finance, a lot of it is digital. You know, we we can go on our app, phone apps at any time and look at our bank account. We can invest in stuff, we can we can get set up with a robo advisor that'll automated make investments for us. So it the the game it shows them how to uh use it's very similar to using investment apps, like retail investing apps. It's very similar. It shows them how that they can use that stuff. So I'd say it's pretty relevant when they do it on the computer, and then also the fact that in uh the FCE's uh portal, they have resources that help them do research so they're not going to like shady sites or like looking to TikTok. There's a uh a very big disconnect with TikTok right now between people trying to get financial advice from there and not everybody is genuine, and I think that's something that young people may not understand yet. That some people are, you know, the clout chasing, they're trying to get views, they may not giving be giving you the best advice. So it's cool to have like, hey, this is a place you can do research. I also recommend Yahoo! Finance is another, you know, online tool that is responsible. But the key is when you're using online tools, it's being responsible online as there's there's a new scam everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 12:03

I did not even think about the implications of fact-finding from social media that wasn't even all my radar. That is such a value because uh with technology it comes all this need to filter because back in the day it was oh gosh, if I just had information and now we have dump trucks.

SPEAKER_02 12:27

So it's overload. Yes, it is, and you know, I think where are our kids at the most? They're on on TikTok, right? And that's that's where they're probably most likely to get financial advice. But I'm not saying every TikTok channel's bad, but you know, it's it's hard when you're a young mind and you're just being exposed to the world and you're just exposed to it all at once to be able to see who's authentic and who actually has a good good intent. I know that can be probably overwhelming.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

That's true because you're looking at other, probably younger people who are also subject to the negative effects of social media like that, you know, like it's built after a slot machine.

SPEAKER_02 13:11

Yeah, so that's why I like to tie financial literacy into digital literacy. Is is, you know, in school we learn how to become literate in reading. Okay, that's great. So once you get up to high school, it's all right, let's talk more about financial literacy, let's talk more about digital literacy because those things are important. Those are real life skills. And that's I think I think that's the core of what I'm trying to do is teach them real life skills in a in a class that's pretty otherwise pretty academic, to teach them, find some way to incorporate the real world. Because I do think that's what parents want to see, is they want their kids to have more real world relevant education. And I feel like I feel like that aligns a lot with the values of Pine Force High. And I think that aligns with my values as well.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

Have you seen any impact on the kids' career trajectory goals? And I say that because when you're talking about TikTok, that made me think about the percentage of kids today, when you ask them, hey, what do you, what do you think you want to be when you grow up? The percentage of kids saying, I want to be a YouTuber is quite high. And there's just like not a grasp on what it takes to pay the bills. Yes. Do you feel like this has changed for any of your students what they see for themselves down the road career-wise? Like, has it changed any of their minds about, well, I was gonna do X, but now I'm gonna do Y?

SPEAKER_02 14:31

I think it does, especially because there's one assignment and we start learning about the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I go have them go on the website and see how much, you know, oh, this is a job I want to do how much it makes, how uh what your job prospects are. I teach them how to use the BLS website. And I do think a lot of them are like, oh wow, you know, I didn't realize that this job was, you know, really hard to get, like, you know, or this job is uh it doesn't pay that great. You know, gig economy, I think uh uh the gig economy is getting pretty huge, like uh Uber driving and S grade. And but people need to understand that it's it's not always as lucrative as you think, and you have to be really careful when you make these decisions. So I think that's something that really helps them out when we talk a lot about financial literacy and we we talk about real world stuff, we we go into those subjects. And I think that it does influence them. I see a lot of kids coming out of of high school these days with with practical choice that had a student that he wants to drive a truck, and I think that's an amazing thing. You know, you don't have to go to college to to do good things, he wants to go to trade school. I see a lot of kids coming out of Pine Forest that you know that want to go to college or want to go to trade school. That's it's really cool to see like kids that are looking at real-world stuff. I have people, oh, I want to be a radiologist, you know, I want to do this and that. Like I think it's really cool to see a lot of the realism that comes out of the choices of things they want to do.

SPEAKER_01 15:49

And the the skills that they'll develop along the way of learning those trades are applicable to other trades, too. Uh we have so many amazing academies in Escambia County. It blows my mind the options that kids have to find really meaningful and well-paying work for themselves. So, and you're you're helping them connect those dots early, which is so amazing. Future employers should be writing thank you letters to yourself. Well, if you think about it, right? Because I mean, you're talking about the connection between digital literacy and financial literacy, but somewhere in that, I think is a third point, which is personal drive. Yeah, you know, because that part of your brain, depending on your financial situation, may not be turned on because you're living a cushy life. You're a kid, you know, your needs are met, potentially, not everyone. But when you put two and two together of these are my options, this is the real world. Now that I'm empowered by this information, I have, I have a leg up and I can, I can go. You know, and so employers love employees like that who come to the table ready to do the thing.

SPEAKER_02 17:05

I think that's kind of where the budget game and everything else I'm trying to do interacts because they play the budget game throughout the year, right? And they're like, oh, this is like a it was like it's a realistic paycheck. And they they have like they gotta pay bills on stuff. And then we start getting to lesson about the Bureau of Labor Statistics and talk about unemployment. We talk about, you know, when we go into and they look at that career that they want, and then they start to see, oh, this is how much I make a year, divide that by 12, is how much I make them up. Like, am I am I gonna get this is how much and we talk about how much housing costs. Like, okay, is this uh something that I can really support myself? Is look at how many how many people get hired, you know? Oh, it's a uh 1% growth rate. Oh, is this like good for me or no? Yeah. Oh, this is what I need to do to do this job. I need to go get this degree or I need to get this license. So I think it's that's kind of where it interacts when you interacts when you have the budget game and they play throughout the year and and do the stock market throughout the year, and then they do that last part where they start looking at real world stuff. If you tell a kid in getting your oh, this job will make uh $50,000, I probably think that's you know, that's oh well that's what I have right now, that's cool. But then uh that's and then they they do this budget game, they see how much, you know, uh how much goes into paying bills and and being able to still being able to save all that stuff, and then all of a sudden they go and they see that same annual salary, whether it be 50,000, 100,000, the that number starts to have something of a face to it. They're like, oh, okay, so now I see what this means. You know, it's uh, you know, this is the this is gonna dictate what lifestyle I can live and what's what's re what's reality. And I think it's really interesting to see them make that connection. Like it's not just a number. Yeah, it's not a number in space.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

Yes. You said it puts a face on it. It totally does put a face on it. Yeah. This has been such a good conversation. I'm so happy that this is a resource for parents in Escambia County. If if a parent has their child in a different high school and maybe wants to inquire about getting this program in the high school that their kid is going to, do you happen to know who they should speak with or so?

SPEAKER_02 19:04

Essentially the the they would need to talk with their administration and see if maybe they could I understand that most of the schools are are starting to adopt the personal finance classes that were mandated by Ron DeSantis. And you know, they could be like, hey, is there a way that the personal finance class could look into doing program the free resources with the FCE, the Florida Council on Education, Economic Education? That's the the people that host the budget game and they host the stock market challenge, and those are both free. I don't have to pay anything. All you have to do is have teacher credentials, be a homeschool teacher or be a public school teacher to enroll kids. And you can make as many accounts as you want, and you can enroll your kids in it if you want to. So that's something I would maybe if if I was a parent, I would inquire. I'd like I'd kind of put that in the administration. Like, oh, you know, is there a way they can uh and they can participate in this? It'd be really great. And you never know, it might they might really like the idea.

SPEAKER_01 19:56

Well, thank you for doing this. This has been great. Thank you for having me. Thanks for listening. Be sure to subscribe and share. Voices United in Education is a production of Scambia County Public Schools.