Teens learn how to invest

Isamar Maldonado is worried about Sears Roebuck & Co. The retailer's stock has been tanking all week, so Isamar sells her 100 shares and buys some Dell instead. She has just one hour before the market closes at 4 p.m.

"Click on that," says Claudia Pagán, her coach and program coordinator for Girl Scouts of Nassau County, N.Y. She points to a link on a Web page detailing another potential investment. "Now read the story and see if it's a good one."

At Roosevelt Junior-Senior High School here on Long Island, Isamar and seven other teenage girls sit before computers researching public companies, and agonizing over which stocks to buy and sell with their imaginary $100,000.

The program - recently launched by Girl Scouts of the USA in partnership with the NASDAQ Educational Foundation - is one of a growing number of financial-literacy initiatives aimed at children. Nonprofit groups, corporations, and schools are jumping on the bandwagon. While instilling the values of saving and investing is important in itself, proponents say it also helps counteract media-driven messages that urge children to overconsume.

"This is an issue that we consider to be of societal importance," says Gary Knell, president and CEO of the Sesame Workshop, which provides content for Merrill Lynch's "Investing Pays Off" program. "It's important to teach kids how the economy works. They shouldn't become victimized by consumerism."

Merrill Lynch has developed a financial-literacy program that consists of employee volunteers, online resources, and a workbook full of lessons for children. "It's about being responsible and teaching the value of saving, and what things are worth," says spokeswoman Selina Morris.

The National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE), which wrote the curriculum for the Investment Pays Off program, shows youngsters how to turn their street smarts into business smarts. At NFTE, the emphasis is on empowerment and financial control through business ownership.

The organization, which targets students from low-income neighborhoods, employs a "train-the-trainer model," says Jane Walsh, NFTE's director of corporate and foundation relations. NFTE offers five-day training programs hosted by major universities including Columbia and Georgetown. The schools provide space, guest lecturers, even college credit. Part of NFTE's mission is to expose children to the idea of ownership as an option, to help break the cycle of poverty and change impoverished neighborhoods.

"These kids have many misconceptions about the shop owner around the corner," says Ms. Walsh. "They think he's rich, but he's barely breaking even."

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