NOTRE DAME STUDENTS GET LESSON IN MONEY

Much of a high school education prepares students to make money. At Notre Dame High School, students are also getting a lesson on how to use the money they earn.

Notre Dame Principal Mary Ann Fischer said: "Schools prepare students to do well in the business world, to get a good job and have money. But sometimes we neglect to teach students how to manage their money. That's what is so practical about this course."

Notre Dame is presenting the course, which teaches personal finance and money management, as part of its business mathematics class.

Angela Schaefer, Notre Dame math and science teacher, and Richard R. Cuba, a certified financial planner with First Financial Planners Inc., team teach the course.

Students are in the second week of the six-week course. They are getting lessons in savings, budgeting, insurance and investments.

"Parents have indicated to me that we need to teach the students how to manage their money besides teaching them how to get a good job," Fischer said.

The culmination of the course is a personal financial plan for each student to use today.

"The sooner they start good habits with their finances the better off they will be," Schaefer said.

In one year over $3,000 pass through the hands of the average U.S. high school student.

"They've got money," Schaefer said. "It's important to know how to budget and save for the future."

Cuba said: "I believe this is one of the areas we are most poorly educated how to use money and how to use credit. People get themselves into financial problems when they don't have to."

For example, he said, over 3.5 million teenagers have access to credit cards. "Very few are taught anything about how to use them responsibly," he said.

Students will learn a little about investments like IRAs, CDs, stocks and bonds. The course also delves into inflation, interest rates, credit and credit cards.

Right now students are keeping track of every penny they spend.

"We will be establishing a budget with that information and then begin setting financial goals," Cuba said.

Schaefer said, "The whole idea is setting up an actual plan they can start working on now."

Students are learning how they might budget and save for a Saturday night date, for Christmas gifts, for college and even for retirement.

"It really is a wonderful program," Schaefer said. "Basically the whole key is to start as soon as they can make plans for the future.

"I think especially high school students are not thinking about long-term goals; they are thinking of today."

The course was developed for high schools by the College for Financial Planning in Denver, Colo. Since the high school program began in 1983, more than 134,000 students have participated.

"This is a program that teaches the students how to use their money in contrast to how to make money," Cuba said.

"A person's biggest asset is not money at all; it's time how long they have until they need their money.

"A 20-year-old who wants to earn $1 million by age of 55 has to save $263.39 a month, invested at 10 percent earning. If the person starts at a young age, it's very feasible to reach that goal.

"If a 40-year-old wants a million by age 55, he has to save $2,412.72 every month, invested at the same rate."

Cuba has taught similar planning sessions for people going through marriage preparation courses and in adult education classes. This is the first time the program has been taught at Notre Dame.