(cheerful instrumental music)
What I love most about these kids
is that they just are so open and kind to one another
and they learn really important skills from each other.
We have about 500 students here at Craig Elementary,
and we have 24 different nationalities
that are represented.
28 different languages.
Students here at Craig are just the most
energetic bunch that you will find.
We have so much energy for learning
and so much desire to become better people.
They're always having a thirst for knowledge
that you won't find at a lot of different schools
that make this school such a great one
for diversity and creativity,
and that's why we're glad that JA is here today.
Junior Achievement is a nonprofit organization.
And our mission is really to help students
bridge the gap between what they're learning in school
and what they need to be successful in the real world.
'Cause we want to expand their minds
and challenge them to think outside the box.
It's really fun to see how excited they get
and how engaged they are
and even though I think most people,
some of these concepts we see them
as big large complicated concepts,
I think JA does a great job of really breaking them down
into something that the kids can really understand,
but have fun learning
and so I don't expect they'll take every single piece away,
but I know because I've seen it with my own kiddos
that there will be pieces of this that they'll remember
and today I hope they remember
the difference between visible money and invisible money.
The activity that I'm leading today
is five different lesson plans with fourth graders
and it's on entrepreneurship,
so we're going to talk a little bit about our region,
the entrepreneurs who are in our region,
and then also the different resources,
whether it's natural, or human, or capital resources,
basically talking about all the steps that you need to take
to have a successful business here in St. Louis.
Junior Achievement skills are really helpful
because they tackle certain areas,
like in fourth grade,
they learn about entrepreneurship
and learning like important life skills
of like budgeting and balancing.
They do it in a fun, creative way
with like games, posters, lot of visuals, conversations.
If we can start talking to students from kindergarten
and continue that conversation
all the way through high school,
then we can make a significant impact
on how they choose to lead their lives going forward.
I recall my JA experience when I was a child,
and what they taught me
with working with money and financial literacy
and also what it meant about opportunity costs
and those moments really set me forward
on a specific path to where I am today.
So when I left to go off to college,
I didn't have all the necessary tools
that I think would have led to better success
early on in my career and in my savings.
And once I got into the career I'm in now,
looking back on it,
boy I wish, you know, some folks had kind of sat me down
and helped out with some of these fundamentals
like I talked about.
We can start to introduce
those concepts of earning and saving
and the difference between needs and wants.
So those students can really make an informed decision
and help figure out how are they going to earn that money
to support those financial goals.
They get to see role models
in various jobs and occupations.
Also just builds relationships
and that's huge to be able to have someone
from our community be able to come into our building
and build a relationship with a student.
This is a two way street for sure.
The kids get a lot out of this but so do we.
I recall last year when we were at the school
at Craig elementary that one of the kids
actually wanted to eat lunch with me.
And then as we were departing for the day,
one of them hugged me.
It was really a heartwarming experience.
We talk about the content we're teaching them,
but it is really that connection
and them just having somebody kind of to talk to
and connect with was a pretty moving moment for me.
It's great to be a mentor to anyone.
And to be a mentor to kids, especially, you know,
it could change how their lives are in the future.
I've done Big Brother, Big Sister in the past, too,
so it's always a reward.
These volunteers not only are facilitating the programs,
but also act as role models for the students
and so it's incredibly important
to have these volunteers, this fresh voice,
this different perspective in the classroom.
The volunteers truly bring our programs to life.