Besieged with questions from her young and energetic audience, Deputy Mayor Sue Singer patiently came up with answers and delivered an important message.
It’s never too early to save a penny.
“It’s good to save a little bit now,” she told a group of second-graders at Gildo Rey Elementary School on Tuesday morning. “What are you saving for?”
Students from Sue Hovde’s and Julie Barber’s classrooms took turns replying with an assortment of answers. One girl said she was saving money so she could give to charity, others were saving up for games and musical instruments. One boy responded with the long-term plan of going to college, another wanted an apartment.
One boy seated quietly in the back row was thinking of something more immediate. “Donuts,” he replied.
Amid their requests, kids received an important lesson: put something aside for a “rainy day” and make wise financial decisions – for themselves and their community.
Singer, a longtime City Councilmember and civic leader, was a guest speaker on Jump$tart Financial Literacy Reading Day. She fielded questions about finance, imparted good advice on money management and read David Birch’s fun tale book, “The King’s Chessboard,” which illustrated the power of compound interest.
Crusade in motion
Jump$tart, a national group, is working to introduce, engage and promote financial literacy in classrooms, homes and beyond. The organization’s nonprofit coalition, Jump$tart Washington, was created to promote the need for financial education throughout the state.
“Our goal is simply to make financial literacy education more available to people – from second-grade students to their parents …,” said Dana Twight, a Jump$tart Washington board member who works in sponsorship development for Newspapers in Education with The Seattle Times Co. “What we learned … is that everyone needs financial education. We have realized that whatever we had in school wasn’t enough. Not everybody gets (financial education) in school.”
Money also remains a forbidden topic for many struggling families, Twight pointed out. The discouraged dialogue in homes brings into focus the importance of providing financial literacy in schools and elsewhere, the coalition insists.
The coalition is making a push to the state Legislature to make financial education a part of the basic curriculum.
“Our group is working to have financial literacy education included in schools K-12,” Twight added.
Gildo Rey Elementary is one of the many statewide stops for Jump$tart Washington, which has provided teacher training seminars and special events for students. The coalition reached thousands of consumers – public and private organizations, educators and non-profit associations – throughout the state last year.
The Jump$tart coalition determined that the average student who graduates from high school lacks basic skills in the management of personal financial affairs. Many are unable to balance a checkbook and most simply have no insight into the basic survival principles involved with earning, spending, saving and investing.
In 2008, Washington high school students failed the national financial literacy survey administered by Jump$tart.
But Jump$tart wants to change the course and offer an emphasis in finance education. To learn more, visit www.wajumpstart.org.
