School of Hard Knocks

I love my daughter's high school economics teacher. As a long term assignment that will last for several months, he has given each high school senior an imaginary profile to work with. My daughter's economic profile is that of a single mom with two kids, she makes 17,000 a year, gets 600 a month child support, has a car payment, car insurance, utilities, rent, gas, groceries, a cell phone as well as two imaginary credit card bills.

She was also handed a fake check book and register. She has to 'pay' her monthly bills to the teacher, pay a baby sitter for day care, explain her budget, etc. She has set due dates for all of her bills to come due on a monthly basis and if she is late to pay her teacher, she is penalized with late fees. If she doesn't take care of her kids, he slaps her with a visit from CPS and she has to 'hire' a lawyer to defend herself in court and pay for that out of her pretend budget.

If she doesn't keep up with writing everything down in her check register, she gets points taken off her grade. He will occassionally throw some unexpected expenses to the kiddos, things like the baby gets sick, you have to take off work to go to the doctors office and buy medication or you have a flat tire and have to buy a new one, etc. So you have to budget for an 'emergency fund'.

Not all of the kids in his class have this particular profile. Some profiles show they are married with a mortgage. Some have a good career but are paying off school loans, some are rich, but they also have a lot of expenses to keep track of. Some are single and self employed. He has a wide variety of circumstances and economic statuses dispersed through out the class room. Pretty much like real life.

I LOVE this teacher! This is the closest thing to a real life budget most of these kids have ever gotten. So far my daughter is doing really well in this assignment. No surprise there! She has been working a part time job at a local radio station since she was a freshman and four years later in her senior year is still working there. She saved enough money to buy her own car. She has several thousand in the bank. She has a certain amount she has to budget out for her personal use, some for gas money for the two weeks between paychecks, entertainment funds, school stuff she wants or needs to purchase, etc. She has been learning that there are economic consequences to her decisions since she got paid her first check.

Unfortunately very few of her friends grasp this concept since none of them have bought their own car. Few have held a job for over a year. Even fewer are financially responsible for buying their own gas. I think that all kids should be brought up understanding the reality that being responsible with money is taught, until it becomes a constructive habit.

I hope that there are more teachers out there like this guy. Mr. Ward, as a parent my hat is off to you!