Money Matters program empowers local youths with financial literacy

The free program is offered through the Boys and Girls Club of Western Pennsylvania.

Josiah Murray of McKeesport aspires to be in real estate and buy a home some day, and a program in McKeesport has been helping him learn how to achieve those goals.

“I joined the program because we don’t do anything about money in school. I wanted something to teach me on how to control my money better and to invest,” said Josiah, a 16-year-old teen ambassador for the Money Matters Financial Literacy program at The Club Teen Center in McKeesport The free, four-year program, part of the Boys and Girls Club of Western Pennsylvania, focuses on teaching teenagers about financial matters.

“I want to expose teenagers to things that aren’t taught in school, such as financial literacy, robotics and credit management,” said Director of Teen and Career Development Scott Flurry.

Money Matters has its own financial literacy curriculum where Flurry teaches credit management, which can accommodate up to 15 teens per session. After completing program requirements, the teens receive a $150 stipend.

“Once they are in college, they are exposed to the ability of getting credit and that is when they can start messing up their credit early on. As adults we know how hard it is to get out of credit card debt,” Flurry said.

This year, Money Matters partnered with entrepreneur and real estate investor Tamara Faye Smith, founder of S&E Services LLC and Homes by TFaye. Faye Smith teaches many different subjects, such as the value of money and how teens could use it, shifting their mindset from scarcity to growth, credit management, banking games, compound interest, Rule of 72 and the power of financial freedom.

Smith, of Monroeville, attended the Boys and Girls Club when she was younger and believes it’s her duty to help the community.

“I am in the position where I have a variety of knowledge, topics and resources that I felt like my duty and responsibility to give back since I am knowledgeable in those areas,” Smith said.

Smith aims to teach children through role playing, creativity, fun and excitement to keep them engaged and wanting to come back. The best way to teach children is through hands-on experience so they can process the information thoroughly.

“I really like their program because it was more interactive, made games, and I didn’t need to speak with the teens for a whole hour,” Flurry jokingly said.

Josiah said his favorite was the cashflow quadrant game created by businessman Robert T. Kiayoski where he was a rat and he had to get out of the rat race of America to get to financial freedom. He had to roll a dice that represented investments and responsibilities, then subtract them from his job salary.

“It was a fun game to play with my friends, and I learned a lot about return on investment. I didn’t like how I looked at my money and thought I made this amount of money, before I subtracted my expenses. I was like dang, I just got paid and I only got a small amount left,’” Murray said.

The teenagers also created vision boards, a collage of images and words that visually represent aspirations and dreams, to help them set goals.

“My favorite class I taught was goal setting and learning about the students’ goals,” Smith said. “They rarely thought about what their future goals are, what is their career plan and their financial goals. For me to plant that seed and put that perspective in their head was major for me.”

On the other hand, the vision board session was the toughest class for Josiah because it was hard for him to find images and to set a specific date and time to his goals.

“I am not good with setting