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Todd Greco, Beloit
8/26/2009 10:52:04 AM
When it comes to calculus or the Roman Empire, some high school teachers are presented with the perennial question from students: “How am I ever going to use this?” For Beloit business education instructor Todd Greco, the question was, “Why did my friend’s family lose their house?”
Greco, who has been teaching business education at Beloit Memorial High School for the last three years, has been bringing lessons of credit card debt, home mortgages and banking collapses into his classes to keep up with the news of the day and students’ questions of how a new recession hit their community, which has one of the highest unemployment rates in not only Wisconsin but the nation.
“Given our local situation, the issue of home foreclosures has been very popular with my students. They want to understand ‘how’ and ‘why’ these things happened and what steps they can take to avoid problems they have seen their own families face,” Greco says. “The students are seeing how topics covered in class are being lived out in their own homes.”
Greco’s class ranges from how to set up a personal budget to subprime mortgages, and he takes his cue from students on where to take discussions.
“Academically speaking, I let the students take me where they want to go and if they have an interest in a specific topic I try to let them run with it,” Greco says. “And without a doubt the last half of the last school year, the questions they asked regarding the housing issues were very pointed and direct in an effort to understand the ‘why’ and ‘how’ this happened as to impact their own lives positively in their future. And so, while many of them really did not have any idea about the details of the situation, they did feel the emotions in their own families and understood that the economic situation was ‘not good’ and desired to learn and understand as much as possible.”
A list of topics in Greco’s class sounds like the front page of any newspaper of the last year: consumer credit, housing (buying/renting), investing (stocks, bonds, real estate), the banking system (Federal Reserve, etc.), budgeting, taxes, insurance (auto, home, life, health), and financial planning.
Many of the lessons covered in the class are new to students who may have just entered the work force, and Greco says he intends for the class to give them a foundation for their buying habits.
“The vast majority of the time students know simply basic concepts such as a credit card is an alternative way to purchase something; however, they may not understand the interest charged may end up increasing the overall cost of the item by, say, 30 percent. Additionally, they may not understand how to compute the interest that is charged,” Greco says. “I seek to empower students to take control of their own financial lives.
“A broad idea that I try to inspire in all of my students is that they can achieve anything they desire financially – non-monetarily as well – provided they learn to make quality decisions and maintain an unmatched work ethic. If someone has to be a millionaire, it may as well be them,” Greco adds. “Most of my students, through three years of survey, think that people that ‘have money’ were born into it. They were just plain lucky. I explain that less than 5 percent of millionaires were lucky enough to be born into wealth and that those currently living in poverty or first-generation immigrants to the United States are four times more likely to achieve the status of millionaire than their other American-born peers. However, what sets the millionaires apart from the other 93 percent of the American population is they had a plan for their financial lives, adapted the plan as needed, and always worked to that end.”
Greco says his drive for teaching comes from his students.
“I enjoy being with the students every day and being surrounded by the amazing diversity we have in our community and school,” he says. “And of course I am motivated indefinitely when former students come and visit, sharing experiences they have had and strategies they have employed in their own lives as a result of taking personal finance. The kids continually motivate me to be at my best every day.”
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