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Learning how to budget money and pay bills

By REBECCA BRIA rbria@timesleader.com

Twelve-year-old Kelsey Monahan knew she wouldn’t be able to afford many luxuries with an annual salary of $21,072.

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Seventh-grade student Aidan McLaughlin peers into the computer in a Motorworld Station at the Junior Achievement Center in Pittston as part of his curriculum experience.

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Seventh-grade student Kami McGhee and classmates work their way around stores and stations as part of their curriculum experience at the Junior Achievement Center in Pittston.

CHARLOTTE BARTIZEK photos/ FOR THE DALLAS POST

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But Monahan was adamant that she would be able to support her daughter by herself and was grateful to have something.

“We might not have all the high-class things, but we’ll survive,” she said of her fictional scenario.

Monahan was one of about 100 seventh-graders from Dallas Middle School who visited the Junior Achievement Finance Park in Pittston Township on Nov. 23. The other half of the seventh-grade made the trip to the center on Nov. 24.

According to Dallas Middle School Principal Tom Duffy, the field trip to the Junior Achievement facility is the culmination of a nine-week Junior Achievement course called “Money Matters” that all seventh-graders at the school take.

Duffy says it is the second year Dallas Middle School has visited the Junior Achievement center. This year’s seventh-grade class also went to the facility to participate in the fifth-grade program BizTown in 2007, the first year the facility opened.

At Finance Park, each student is given a play debit card that lists his or her annual salary, marital status, ages of children and taxes. The students’ salaries are approximately between $23,000 and $64,000, reflective of salaries in Northeastern Pennsylvania.

The students had 17 budgeting items, including homes, cars, phones, student loans, savings, insurance, etc. They also had to collect bills and option sheets so they could decide the minimum and maximum amount they could pay on each bill.

“The idea is to help students build a personal budget and realize what things cost and to help them realize what they’ll have to pay for when they get older,” said Melissa Turlip, vice president of education at the Junior Achievement center.

Duffy says about 20 parent volunteers of Dallas Middle School students ran the Finance Park each day, arriving for training an hour and a half prior to the students the morning of the event.

Parent volunteer Barbara Goode, mother of seventh-grader Jesse Goode, led the philanthropy group. She says she also volunteered for Junior Achievement BizTown two years ago when Jesse was in fifth-grade in the Dallas School District.

“It’s nice to see how much they learn because I don’t remember learning about the finance part of life when I was a kid,” Goode said.

Aaron Eldred, 12, was happy with his $51,060 salary because it allowed him to purchase a 2003 Hummer with payments of $514 a month.

“I got my dream car,” he said of his fictional lot in life. “Since I don’t have any kids or anything, all of the money goes to paying for myself. There’s a lot of money left over.”

Allen Fell, 13, felt he was high class with an annual salary of $59,088. Fell was supposed to be married with no children, bought a Porsche and feels his experience with Junior Achievement taught him how to balance money.

“When you grow older and get paychecks, you’ll know how to spend it,” he said.

But not everyone felt like Eldred and Fell.

Thirteen-year-old Nick Romanowski did not think his $25,476 salary was enough to support a wife and one child. He settled for a Toyota Tacoma.

Amy Bolton, 13, said Finance Park was fun, but gave her a glimpse of the responsibilities that come with having a family.

“It’s like the real world, sort of, except in smaller buildings,” she said. “I’m learning it takes a lot of work to take care of the stuff you have to do to take care of your family.”