International Teachers Get Lessons on Economics

Spring Hill teacher Shelby Garner (standing second from right) explains the Mini-Society program to Latin educators (L-R) Claudia Sicoli from Lima, Peru; Carmen Leticia Jemenez from Guadalajara, Mexico; Santiago Foguet from Tucuman, Argentina; and interpreter Patricia Yanez Ibanez while students (L-R) Shruti Patel, Michael Baker and Tye Mitchell complete work in their notebooks.

Latin American educators spent their first Monday in Georgia observing how Fayette’s teachers deliver lessons on economics.

Two of the school system’s top economics teachers, Chris Cannon, 12th grade at Sandy Creek High, and Shelby Garner, third grade at Spring Hill Elementary, were selected by the Georgia Council on Economic Education as classroom hosts for the Latin delegation taking part in a study tour on economic education in the United States.

Fayette’s classrooms were the first of several the visiting educators planned to see during their weeklong stay May 2-6 in the metro Atlanta area. The educators are participants of the Cooperative Education Exchange Program (CEEP) offered through the national Council for Economic Education and funded by the U.S. Department of Education in cooperation with the U.S. Department of State. After Georgia, they will travel to Michigan and Washington, D.C.

Mini-Society, a program used in all of Fayette’s third grade classrooms to teach students about economics, government, entrepreneurship, career opportunity, consumer issues, and values, was the focus of the observation at Spring Hill Elementary.

Students studied production methods by examining the assembly of hamburgers done by one individual compared to an assembly line with seven persons each assigned a particular task. Teacher Shelby Garner had the students participate in a hands-on burger making activity to demonstrate. While nearly twice as many burgers were completed using the assembly line, the students quickly learned areas where they needed to hire additional workers to keep the line moving and quality control in place.

The international visitors, representing the countries of Uruguay, Argentina, Mexico, and Peru, spent nearly three hours in Garner’s classroom observing her teaching methods and talking to students. They will take what they learned from their visit and apply it to their economic education curriculum at home.

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Fayette County High Economic Students Win Region Championship

Fayette County High School regional champions (L-R) Jada Bridges, CeCee Chaney and Malarah Cook (far right) celebrate their win with teacher Deborah Rasnake and State School Superintendent Kathy Cox, who served as the banquet’s keynote speaker.

As investors pull their money away from the stock market, some savvy high school students prove that investing is profitable, even in tough economic times.

Three students in Deborah Rasnake’s economics class at Fayette County High School participated in the Georgia Stock Market Game at the beginning of the school year, taking a hypothetical $100,000 and turning a $16,896 profit in a 10-week period. They earned the most money in their region and were crowned region champions. The winning students are Jada Bridges, CeCee Chaney and Malarah Cook. They were honored, along with other regional winners, at a banquet held at the Georgia Railroad Freight Depot in Atlanta earlier this month.

The Georgia Council on Economic Education sponsors the Stock Market Game each fall and spring semester for elementary through high school students. Students start off with a hypothetical portfolio of $100,000 and for 10 weeks they research publicly traded companies on the Internet, read business publications and crunch numbers to select stocks. The team from each region with the highest portfolio value at the end of the 10 weeks wins.

The Stock Market Game is designed to give teachers a tool for helping students develop a solid understanding of how private enterprise works. Economic education is not just about financial literacy; it’s also about the larger economic forces that affect everyone’s financial circumstance.

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Starr's Mill HS Economics Team Advances to Nationals

From state champions, to regional winners and now on to the national championships, economic students at Starr’s Mill High are on a roll.

The team of students emerged as the winners of the southern regional 2009 Council on Economic Education/Goldman Sachs Foundation National Economics Challenge held at the Federal Reserve Bank in Atlanta on April 27. The Starr’s Mill team was one of 16 from across the 11-state Southeast region that competed in the tournament.

Team members include Keegan Christensen, Joseph Morrow, Ben Payne and Kendall Reeves. Led by economics teacher Mark DeCourcy, the team will travel, all expenses paid, to the National Economics Challenge Championship Finals in New York City May 16-18. They will join students from other parts of the United States to celebrate their regional winnings as well as compete in the semi-finals with the top two teams facing off at the final competition on May 18 before a live audience at Scholastic Auditorium.

The National Economics Challenge is an academic tournament that tests high school students both individually and as teams on their economic knowledge and problem solving skills. It is a competition demanding both critical thinking and teamwork.

Winners of the national championship and their teachers each receive $3,000 U.S. Savings Bonds with the runner-up teams and their teachers receiving $1,500 U.S. Savings Bonds.

An estimated 4,000 high school students in about 1,000 teams from 38 states around the country competed in the National Economics Challenge Championship Finals last year.

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