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Take KARE of Your Money: 'Reality Fair' gives students hands-on lesson in family finance

Students get to be adults for a day, managing a budget, a family and life's random hurdles.

APPLE VALLEY, Minn. — There are a lot of ways to teach a lesson - books, computers, lectures - but there are also the everyday lessons we learn from just living our lives.

Wings Financial is speeding up that process, giving high schoolers a chance to live the life of an adult for a day.

“They’re always like, 'Whoa!'” Apple Valley High School teacher Claire Opsahl says.

But they quickly find out, being an adult isn’t always easy.

“Students get a lot out of this because they don’t realize how much certain finances go into certain categories of life,” Opsahl says.

The Wings Financial “Reality Fair” starts by giving each student a folder.

In that folder they’ll find a job, a salary, and a unique family situation.

“I’m a middle school teacher who is married and I have two kids,” ninth grader Veronica De Santis says.

Students then go out to nearly a dozen stations at the school, where a volunteer presents them with a life-changing decision to make.

“I just spent $390 a month for a car and $200 for gas,” De Santis says.

Every decision affects their monthly budget, and the goal is to end with a little money left over.

Some of the decisions are made for them, like random health problems, and accidents, that mimic the randomness of real life.

These random variables include the “wheel of fate” that dishes out random calamities, and the dreaded nurse who hands out random health problems.

Most of the students will fail, not because they’re incapable, but because that’s the point of the Reality Fair - to teach kids the harsh realities of adult life.

“Sometimes kids do run out of money and a lot of kids will run up and ask, 'What can we do?'” Opsahl says.

Students start out with a lot of money to spend.  

"I'm doing pretty good,” De Santis says.

However, that money doesn’t last long, once they start spending it on necessities such as housing and child care.

"Oh my gosh!” De Santis says, seeing the cost of child care.

“That’s a lot of money. It’s probably the most I’ve spent.”

De Santis was one of the lucky ones who walked away with a little extra money.

She decided to spend that money on charitable donations and retirement.

“You should be smart with your money and just learn how much things actually cost," De Santis says.

Besides Apple Valley, three other high schools have held Reality Fairs to teach students about money.

Wings Financial is hoping to bring the idea to more schools in the coming years.

If you’re interested in bringing the Reality Fair to your school, contact Trysh Olson by phone at (952)-997-8210 or by email at polson@wingsfinancial.com

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