March 2, 2016 at 5:20 p.m.
RHS seniors get exposure to balancing wants, needs on a budget
Mad Money gives students practice, training for life after school
RHS seniors get exposure to balancing wants, needs on a budget
The sixth annual Mad Money event sponsored by Partners in Education (PIE), in collaboration with the School District of Rhinelander, not only presented students with a practical look at the household budgeting process, it also gave them valuable knowledge about financial planning, job seeking and more.
This year's event featured both a budget simulation in the morning and an employability skill sessions in the afternoon.
In the morning session, the students selected the job they wanted after finishing their education along with a monthly income, what their spouse did for a living and made a month, along with what their student loan debt would be. They then got to select the housing, transportation, food, household necessities, clothing, day care and needs they would want, but had to make all of the payments from a checkbook to each "merchant" for all of these things.
Ben Meyer, PIE vice president, said the brush with reality was something the students appreciated.
"We find that this is something that is very well-received by the students because they are learning skills and learning life lessons they perhaps didn't know going into something like this," Meyer said. "They are learning how to budget, they are learning how to do an interview, they are learning how to write a resume, they are learning how to read a paystub when they get it back. For some students, these are all new skills and new ideas."
Meyer said for many of the students, budgeting on this scale is something they have never done before.
"Frankly, this morning there were a lot of kids who went broke," Meyer said. "And in our mind, that's not the worst thing in the world because it teaches a lesson about budgeting."
Kids learned to start out with a less expensive home - with a lower monthly payment - or a lower priced car and buy generic foods until they see what is left over after paying for necessities.
"I think that a lot of students went right away to buy a house and buy a car," Meyer said. "But many of them bought an expensive house or expensive car, so that squeezes you for the rest of the month on the various other expenses you've got to pay."
After lunch, the students rotated between five different sessions to practice employability skills. These sessions included mock interviews, resume writing, marketing yourself (which included what not to share on social media), customer service and understanding your paystub.
Many of the people who conducted the mock job interviews were business leaders who interview job candidates in the real world. After interviewing the students, they would offer feedback on what they were doing that would give an interviewer a bad impression.
This is one of many events that PIE puts on in conjunction with all grade levels of district students.
"PIE is trying to partner with our schools to give our students a lot of opportunities," Meyer said.
He said the main focus is to get the business community more involved with the students while they are still in school.
"Because the people who are in school now are their future employees, or future leaders of some of these businesses," he said. "And the business community in Rhinelander has been absolutely awesome and wonderful to work with. They have been giving of their time, they have been giving up their resources, and they have been giving of their expertise to both PIE and our education system."
Jamie Taylor may be reached at [email protected].
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