JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The stock market: many of us are invested in it, but not many of us can understand the day-to-day happenings. Hundreds of students on the first coast are taking it head on by making financial literacy a competition.
First the school bell, then the stock market opening bell. 275 high school students from Raines, Fletcher, Englewood and Bartram Trail High Schools are becoming stock traders for a semester.
Simulated, of course.
“We sold almost everything to have that IPO and we went from 3rd to first!" said Aiden Messer, junior.
Students at Englewood High are taking stock in their future with Junior Achievement of North Florida’s stock market simulation course.
“Beginning we were up real high. We were riding on air," Messer explains. "Then we went down and I looked at an IPO date just before the end and I knew that was our big break.”
Did you understand that? These kids are ahead of the curve.
JROTC Battalion Commander Messer’s team took first place and will move on to the next competition along with a few other teams from this school.
The simulation goes like this: 8 minutes on the clock to plan what to invest in with $500,000 available. Then the simulator goes through 45 days of trading, each day a minute long, with business news scrolling across the screen. Stocks were going up, going down, being traded and so on.
“What we are trying to do here is get kids excited about their future," said Tiffany Guthrie with Junior Achievement. "Understanding that the choices they make now can help them have a better outcome in the future.”
Guthrie is the Vice President of Programs and Partnerships at Junior Achievement. They’ve partnered with 4 local high schools to pilot this program, which exists in other parts of the state but hadn't yet been introduced in North Florida.
It may not be real money right now, but they’re investing in their future.
“Soon as I get a job I’m going to start investing so by the time I’m ancient I’ll actually have money to play around with," Messer said.
The three teams from that class were chosen based on who made the most money during the simulation. They will meet teams from each school to compete in a stock market simulation on March 30th at TIAA Bank Field.
So if you hear a crowd cheering from the stadium, it’s the NASDAQ not the Jags!