California, where our most recent student field trip took place, is no stranger to seismic shifts. This time it was in the viewpoints of girls from Harvard-Westlake as they interacted with female financial professionals at TD Ameritrade’s offices in Los Angeles. The magnitude of intriguing information about bonds delivered by Kelly Alexander, a private client investment consultant with TD Ameritrade, made a widespread impact on the students’ young minds—yes, it literally had the girls on the edges of their seats.
The girls also got a comprehensive roadmap of what it’s like to manage their own savings and investments. They now understand that investment knowledge will be one of their greatest assets as they go through life.
In addition, the girls learned how to become a financial pro during a panel moderated by Gale Northrop, Regional Director of TD Ameritrade that included Sara Qazi, Director of Global Sports & Entertainment from Morgan Stanley and Stasia Washington, Managing Director of First Foundation Advisors. Eyes lit up as they thought about landscape changes in their future!
Among the attendees was a mother-daughter duo…Sabina and Gemma Lippman. Sabina spearheaded our launch in California—she reached out to RTSWS after researching online for a financial education program tailored for girls like her 13-year-old daughter, Gemma.
“In earlier times, the roles were divided and women did not have control of the creation or management of the finances. That’s changing, but not quickly enough,” said Sabina. “Rock The Street, Wall Street helps girls think about what roles they want for themselves. For girls, if patterns continue where they don’t focus on math and finance in the same percentages as their male peers, they will become women who don’t know how to make it on their own.”
Sabina is arming her daughter with the tools to be financially independent and giving her a strong foundation to reach her full potential. She has an impressive resume herself including owning her own firm and having an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management. Sabina wanted her daughter to learn from women in the finance field who “walked the talk” with our program.
“I knew there had to be a more authentic source of learning for teenagers. In my personal and professional life, I’ve noticed a big difference in how women approach risk and new challenges,” said Sabina. “As mothers, we need to share fundamentals early with our daughters and provide them with tools to make them more capable in managing their future selves and expose them, too, to careers that may now be considered male-centric.”
According to The 2018 JA Teens & Personal Finance Survey, only 14 percent of teenagers get their financial advice from a professional financial advisor. Of particular concern is that 33% get it from social media and 28% from their friends. That’s where Rock The Street, Wall Street comes in…our female volunteer instructors have the “street cred” they need to educate and they know how to add the “cool factor” and relevency by introducing financial concepts using pop culture.
“I thought it was going to be a lecture type thing. Turned out it was something my friends and I could really relate to—the female instructors helped and we knew it was information we would need,” said Gemma. “I really like the part where we had to create a budget. It got us working together and made everything more real.”
Rock The Street, Wall Street helps bring math to their real world by introducing it in terms of money…not the mythical kind, but rather the hard earned, taxed, saved and invested, kind. Our curriculum rips from the headlines, is immersive and shows teenage girls what they need to learn about finance to get what we are all after—financial freedom.
“I don’t think girls aren’t trying in math, it’s more that we just don’t know what it can do,” said Gemma. “Now that I know, I want a tool that allows me to have more options in life and will reduce the limitations that may come my way as I grow. I want this skill that I can call my own.”
Set a course for female financial independence at a school in your area. Contact us.
