Activism Log #2

Jessica Schwendeman
WST 3015 – Perez
2/27/10

Activism: This week we did the second half of the presentation, “The Penny Project” for the Girl Scout Outreach troop on Friday evening from 4:00pm – 7:00pm at the Bithlo Community Center. We split up a lot of the presentation, so I didn’t get to facilitate as much as I had last week. We started with an icebreaker asking the girls how their week had been, and then got into talking about financial literacy. After coloring with them in their “funbooks” and learning about the importance of saving, we split them up and had half of the girls decorate ceramic piggy banks and the other half play a board game, which came with the program materials. I worked with the board game and to be honest I didn’t particularly care for it. The workshop emphasizes decision-making, wants and needs, and choosing to save and invest over spending money on frivolous items. The game, however, I found to be more about luck – the girls would roll the die and then would have to do whatever was on that space, like “Pay your neighbor $2”, or “Collect $.75 from the bank”. There was no decision making or skill review involved, and it was completely up to chance who did well. Even so, through the whole workshop that was really the only thing that I didn’t like. After each girl had a chance playing the game and decorated a piggy bank, we then talked about investing and other forms of money, different from cash – debit and credit cards. At the conclusion of the workshop, we surprised the girls with apple pie and ice cream, along with their merit badges.

Reflection: The girls are all from less economically advantaged conditions, and I think that our message of financial literacy is empowering to them. I’m happy to know that we are providing them with a basis from which to learn how to make autonomous decisions about their money and spending/saving habits. Additionally, I think that they felt a real feeling of accomplishment after completing the workshop and getting their badges.

Reciprocity: I am getting a lot out of this experience! The girls are wonderful and I enjoyed working with them. I think it is also helping me to develop my public speaking skills, and it’s also cementing my desire to eventually work with the Girl Scouts, which I think would be an amazing career option.