Are you interested in changing the financial future for the next generation?

The Money Academy is expanding to offer our programs in more schools throughout Austin.  We are looking for new Leaders to deliver our After School programs and Summer Camps.
Here’s what you need to know to get involved:

What Is The Money Academy?
The Money Academy provides programs where kids learn all about money. Can you imagine what your life would be like now if you had learned how money really works at the age of 9? In our flagship program, The Money Academy Summer Camp, kids start and run their own business—and keep the profit! Through real life trial and error experience, kids learn about accountability, teamwork, integrity, business development, business math and much, much more. Kids leave our program saying it was one of the best experiences that they have had.
If you are accepted into our leadership program, you will be trained in a powerful, cutting edge methodology that will alter your experience of working with kids and provide you with valuable experience with money.
Are You Looking For This?
The Money Academy Camp Leader works with approximately 20 young people or teens in developing, testing, and running a successful business during a week long camp. The camp leader sets the kids up with tools and training and then turns the business over entirely to the kids while remaining responsible for our kids’ safety and our relationship with our host.
Are We Looking for You?
The Money Academy Regional Director and Camp Leader is responsible, energetic, causative and inspired by the idea of empowering children. In addition, you…

• are a highly accountable and reliable professional.
•  have experience working with children and delivering some kind of curriculum.
• are willing to be trained in another methodology.
• are capable of effectively working with groups of people, operating effectively with a time line, and producing results.
•  can manage multiple objectives at one time while still focusing on the big picture.
•  are committed to making a difference with kids and open to being trained in a new and cutting edge methodology that may challenge your current understanding about leadership, children and learning.

What It Takes:
1) 1-year or more of experience leading or working with groups of children.
2) Experience managing events or leading from a curriculum.
3) Provide 3 glowing professional references.
4) Be available to lead 4-6 camps (8-5 Monday through Friday)   June through August each summer
5) Be available the Sunday afternoon before each camp for a planning meeting
6) Training is provided and includes:

• One day at our Annual Team Leadership Training
• 2.5 days observing at an ongoing camp
• TEA Approved On-line training programs (2-3 hours)

Future Business Opportunity
Money Academy will be expanding to offer our programs in new markets through franchising.  As a Camp Leader and Regional Representative, you will be in a unique position to continue conducting business in your market through a franchising license.  Building a business of your own, utilizing the expertise and curriculum of Money Academy will give you an opportunity to invest in your own future of financial security.

Free Game Event: “Blast the Money Trap”

Monday,
June 20th
6:30 – 7:30
Free Event!
Appetizers Provided

Come join the Money Academy at Neo Cantina where kids and parents will play “Blast The Money Trap” .  In this highly interactive game,  players get the opportunity to make investments and build their assets in a fun, kid friendly style.

The game is uniquely oriented to kids perspective and capacity to understand money at their age.  This provides them real life examples that they can easily assimilate into their own lives.  They begin to see the value of saving to invest vs. only using money for spending.

Every family that attends receives
$25 Tuition Discount to Money Academy Camp!

Game playing starts at 6:30 and completes at 7:30.   Appetizers will be served and the event is FREE!  You must call to reserve your space at the table.  For kids ages 7 – 15 and their parents.

University Federal Credit Union gives Camp Graduates free accounts!

Like The Money Academy, University Federal Credit Union understands the importance of setting a sound foundation for your kid’s financial future. As part of  camp enrollment, all campers will receive their share of their business profit by direct deposit into a UFCU savings account.

These Free accounts are provided, courtesy of  University Federal, as a service to ensure that your child’s hard earned camp funds are deposited quickly and safely along with giving them an opportunity to continue to save and earn on their money.

The Kidz/ Teen Solution Package gives you:

• Ki dz /Teen Savings Account  No Monthly Fee and a Free ATM card ( dividends paid quarterly on balance of $5 or more*)

• Option to add:   12 mo.-Early Savers Certificate.  Minimum opening deposit of $100, add more money anytime, divi dends paid monthly at 3% up to $20,000*.

First Camp of summer starts June 6th!

Our first camp of the summer starts Monday and there is still room to enroll your child in the best experience of their summer!   Parents report that what their kids learn about money in camp stays with them forever.  After 7 years of working with kids in this  program,  we’ve seen dramatic results from the graduates.

Kids are bombarded with messages of consumption and spending from the media and the culture.  How are we going to ensure their future of financial responsibility and independence?

We have to engage them in real-life, real-money experiences that have them learn about money first hand.  Most importantly, they can see for themselves that they are many ways to use money besides spending.  What if we used money to make more money?   Now that’s not something that was never taught in school!  And don’t we all wish we had learned that when we were kids.

Money Academy Camp gets kids inspired to use money to build assets and financial independence.  In camp, the kids create a real business for the week, sell a product for real money, and they get to keep the PROFITS!   Now that’s what gets their attention.

Make an “Investment” in your child’s financial future!

Home School Scholarships

Our children deserve to learn about money and how to handle it so that they can develop healthy attitudes and be empowered to make good financial decisions. We must teach them about financial issues just as surely as they need to understand science and social studies.

Life skills and project based experiences provide the best opportunities for kids to really develop their critical thinking and independence. The Money Academy Camp gives kids real-life, real-money experience through creating a business project together in just one week. They make and sell and real product and get to keep the profits!

Through a sponsorship partner, we are offering 4 partial scholarships of $150 exclusively to home schooled students into selected Austin sessions, an a first come-first served basis.  Additionally, we are offering a $50 tuition discount into ANY session at any location.  Click Here for the Scholarship

Scholarship Sessions:
June 6 – Kerbey Lane Cafe NW
June 13 – Gatti-Town, South

NPR’s “All Things Considered” speaking with a Money Academy graduate

Listen to what a Money Academy Graduate Jonathan Gonzalez  told Mose Buchele in an interview on KUT.

Austin Camp Teaches Financial Skills.

Show Me The Money!

Show Me The Money!

The Money Academy will host a financial literacy program for East Austin students and parents at Kealing Middle School on April 30. The free program, a service project co-sponsored by A+ Federal Credit Union and Frost Bank, Central East Austin Weed and Seed, Ujamaa Community Foundation of Austin, and Austin Independent School District: Kealing Middle School,  is entitled “Show Me The Money” and will give the 150attendees a chance to participate in a hands-on money workshop.

“When it comes to money, parents are thinking, ‘My kids are in trouble,’” said Gayle Reaume, the founder and CEO of The Money Academy. “They’re thinking, ‘How am I going to help them get out on their own? How can I teach them? What do they need to know?’ The answer is you have to give them the experience of money so that they will learn the fundamentals first hand. The Money Academy gives them real-life, real-money experience and what they learn produces lifelong habits of financial responsibility.”

Students will participate in The Money Academy’s signature game, “Blast The Money Trap,” which gives kids a chance to use money and see the firsthand consequences of their financial decisions. The students will also learn about how compound interest works, how to measure wealth and the difference between liabilities and assets.

The Money Academy, which offers summer camps, school curricula and “Blast the Money Trap” game for kids age eight to 18, has previously been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Entrepreneur.com, Austin American-Statesman, Austin Woman and on Bankrate.com, among many other media outlets.

It’s all about how Money Goes Out!

The ongoing question from parents about kids and money is always rooted in how to give kids money and how much. The real important financial experience that kids need from a young age is how to make choices with the money they do have.

Janet Bodnar, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance Editor offers a few ideas in this recent blog.

An allowance is the best hands-on tool for teaching children how to manage money. As I always say, kids will spend unlimited amounts of money as long as it’s yours. When their own cash is on the line, it’s a whole new ballgame. An allowance teaches them to make choices, which is the key to smart money management.

At what age should parents start an allowance, and how much?
Age 6 or 7 is a good time to begin. Children are learning about money in school, so they know that ten dimes equal four quarters equal one dollar. Money is an abstract concept for kids, and at this age they’re gaining the maturity to understand how it works and how far it will go. I think it’s reasonable to start with a basic weekly allowance equal to half a child’s age. You can adjust that up or down depending on what expenses the allowance is expected to cover.

Here’s the biggie: Should the allowance be tied to chores?
I don’t think the basic allowance should be tied to chores. Kids should do chores because you ask them to; if they made the mess, they should clean it up without expecting to be paid. Besides, after years of writing about kids and money, I’ve learned that parents often have trouble keeping track of the chores that children do (or don’t do), so the system falls apart.

That doesn’t mean that kids get the money with no strings attached. The basic allowance comes with financial responsibilities—kids have to do financial chores, such as paying for their own collectibles or refreshments at the movies (elementary-age children); mall excursions and after-school snacks with their friends (middle-school kids); and clothing and gasoline (high school students).

Should parents have a say in what teenagers do with income from a job?
By all means. It’s fine for parents to require teens to save part of their income for college. And teenagers should be at least partially responsible for paying for the other big Cs of teen life: clothes, concerts, cars and cell phones. Once they start driving, they should pay for their own gasoline. If they’re on the family cell-phone plan, they could pay for their own phone plus any overage charges. And concerts and other entertainment should be on their tab.

Should I give my kid a credit card?
No. I’ve laid out a four-step plan for teaching kids how to manage plastic, starting with cash, then ATM cards, debit cards and finally credit cards. Once they’re comfortable managing their own debit card and balancing their checking account, they can apply for a credit card—on their own. They’ll build their own credit record, and yours won’t be on the line.

Blog Radio Interview on Kids and Money

The best way to have more security with your money is to increase your confidence and knowledge around it.  Money Academy Founder, Gayle Reaume, was a recent guest on the show.  Join Financial Woman radio host Camille Gaines as she shares money and related topics that will inspire and motivate you to not only own, but embrace your financial journey.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf

Listen to internet radio with Camille Gaines on Blog Talk Radio

Kids and Allowance

I consistently assert that the only way to learn about money is to get experience with it from a young age. That’s why at Money Academy Camp, we give kids a chance to get real life, real money experience through starting a business for a week. And now from the parenting experts at Love and Logic, read more on why this is important!

From Kristan Leatherman, M.S at Love and Logic:

If we give equipment to kids to play sports and instruments to play music then it follows we should give kids money to learn how to use it wisely.

In the truest sense of the word, an allowance allows. It allows kids to learn the value and meaning of money with hands-on experiences. And it allows parents the opportunities to prepare their children for their financial future.

Here are a few ways to get started:

* Separate allowance from chores. Chores are contributions kids should do for free because they are a part of your family.

* Provide opportunities to earn money. If you want your kids to learn to earn money, you can give them jobs to do. Jobs are extra tasks beyond chores that kids can be paid to do.

* Nothing teaches the value of a buck faster than running out of money when you really want something. The amount of allowance is not as important as kids getting to practice with their own money when mistakes are small and affordable.