- Welcome to "Inland Edition," where this season we're having conversations with people who represent nonprofit organizations [light background music] working to make the Inland Empire a better place.

My name is Joe Richardson.

I'm a local attorney, Inland Empire resident and your host.

And today, we're gonna chat with Erin Welch, the director of development for Junior Achievement of Southern California Orange County.

Junior Achievement is the world's largest organization dedicated to educating students in grades K-through-12 about financial literacy, work readiness, and entrepreneurship.

It seeks to energize students around academics and their future possibilities by helping them envision a brighter future and enhancing the skills needed to succeed in the modern world.

Erin has a wealth of experience in education with a strong focus on improving student outcomes.

Her background in education technology and liberal arts and sciences has consistently helped her increase board involvement and achieve fundraising targets.

Let's meet her, and learn more about how Junior Achievement is impacting our youth.

[soft piano music] ♪ [gentle upbeat music] ♪ ♪ ♪ - [Joe] From Junior Achievement of Orange County and the Inland Empire, I'm proud to welcome our director of development, Erin Welch.

Thank you so much for being here on "Inland Edition."

- Well, thank you for hosting me.

I'm excited to be here.

- So, let's build the house a little bit.

Talk about your background.

Was there kind of a, I dunno, an "aha moment" that gets you into nonprofit, in general, and this nonprofit in particular?

Or, was it a series of moments?

- It was a series of moments.

So, I started off in 4H, and I became-- just rose to the leadership.

I was a state Diamond Star, which is the top ranks in California.

It wasn't something I never thought about.

I didn't even realize nonprofit was a opportunity as a job.

- [Joe] You didn't know it was a thing.

- Yeah.

I wanted to be a teacher, wanted to be a veterinarian, wanted be everything else.

- Right, sure!

- And then, just opportunities kept opening.

And, I got invited to be part of the Arthritis Foundation, and a leader in National MS Society all the way in Washington DC.

- Wow.

- And then, I went back to teaching.

- Right.

Sure.

- And, I said if I was to ever leave teaching, it would be because I wanted to advocate for something that was missing and broken in education.

- Sure, sure.

- And so, that kind of, I had the opportunity to work for Junior Achievement, fell in love with it.

Knowing financial literacy is not a part of our curriculum.

- Right.

- And, just had the opportunity, and jumped ship.

And now, working full-time back at nonprofit, but also advocating for the gaps in education.

- Right.

Now, this is huge because you are a teacher.

You taught seventh grade for five years.

You said off camera that you were "the" only seventh grade teacher at your school.

- Yes.

- And, you taught all of the subjects!

- Yes.

- So, you're totally getting cross-trained and the whole thing.

Tell us more about how your education background really informs the work that you do now.

- So now, I can speak on behalf because our curriculum is aligned with state and national standards.

- Right.

- And, people are like, what's that?

We don't have a standard for financial literacy in California.

- Right.

- Well, I know the standards are-- Reading and math standards when we are teaching our students.

We're not taking education away.

We're just enhancing it.

- Right.

So, it's amazing that technically speaking, California does not have "financial literacy" standards.

- No.

- For, like, teaching.

Right?

To be taught to K-through-12.

- Right.

So, we are one of two states that do not have a financial literacy standard.

- Unbelievable.

- As much money as that rolls through California, - Right.

- it's unheard of.

Why?

- Right.

Right.

So, obviously Junior Achievement really fills a gap and gives us something that we don't have.

Talk about, you know, Junior Achievement I like to call is-- I do this show enough where I have what I call "name brand" organizations, name brand nonprofits, ones that have a lot of branches that people may have been therefore more likely to have heard about or heard of.

But, tell us some stuff we don't know.

Things we think we know about Junior Achievement that we really don't know.

- So, we are a over a hundred-year-old organization.

We are in six continents.

Over a hundred countries.

- Right.

- Over 40 different programs.

Junior Achievement started out as a club.

- [Joe] Wow.

- [Erin] And, it was a club created by businessmen for their kids.

- Right.

- And, over the years, it's just changed and evolved and grown.

- Right.

- And now, we go into schools, we work directly with the schools, the districts, the teachers.

And, we teach the financial literacy or entrepreneurship.

or work readiness, whatever pillar the school is interested in.

- Right.

I'm gonna ask a question that is probably such a simple question that most people wouldn't ask it, but I'm the host so I can ask what I wanna ask!

But, give us something that we might not be thinking of from the standpoint of someone that is the director of development for the organization.

Why is financial literacy important?

- Well, financial literacy is-- can help kids get out of poverty, for one.

Yeah.

Students, when they leave our program, and sometimes we just do a one-time program.

Sometimes, we are repeating programs.

When they leave, they feel more knowledgeable.

They feel like they can get out.

If we were to track a student from kindergarten, when we start as young as we have and track it, by the time they reach high school, they would be able to know how to invest money.

- What do kids that are going to learn financial literacy, what do they learn first?

- So, if we start out at kindergarten, you get the big book and they're teaching-- learning needs versus wants.

- Right.

- And then, we build upon there.

And then, when they get into, so perhaps fifth grade, they're learning free market economy.

They're learning resources.

They're learning the difference between human resources and our product resources.

And, they're actually even exploring different careers.

- Right.

- And then, sometimes it's just about teaching 'em just money.

- Right, sure.

- In high school they are learning what a credit card is.

How to manage a credit card; how to manage their accounts.

- Talk about your sources of funding.

And, the reason why I'm asking you to do that is there's this-- I had a teacher who used to talk about the dramatic irony of a story.

You know, she's an English teacher.

It seems this way, but it's actually this way.

So, we would think that because a lot of people would think, 'cause Junior Achievement, we've all heard of it, we know it.

Our nephew's in the class in another state or whatever else, that money is easy to come by and that it's always there and it's all there.

Particularly as it pertains to the Inland Empire, I've found that in some of everything, we-- There is-?

We are kind of forgotten on the resource side.

So, talk a little bit about that and what's been your experience in that area.

- So, we're usually funded-- One of our primary funding sources is the banks 'cause it's a natural fit.

- Oh sure, okay.

Yeah, that makes sense.

- But, we have also national partners like Chick-fil-A.

- Okay!

- They came in and the owners of Southern California, all franchisee, the owners all decided to contribute together.

Pool funding to have a three-year storefront at Finance Park, but also to have a JA day in the Inland Empire.

- Right.

- Because they knew that that distance may not happen, getting the students to Finance Park.

We have fundings from just someone just saying, "Hey, I wanna sponsor a child."

Because the value of the product, it's $125 per student.

We usually say about $5,000 per class.

- Right.

Sure.

- And, what that does allow is when there's overage, we each can scholarship in another class.

- Right, oh wow.

How big is your staff?

Because you're carrying-- you're covering a large land area here.

- Yeah.

So, this is the first time in many years that we have two staff who are in the Inland Empire who are part of the fabric of the community.

And, this just happened as of January.

And so, right now we have two staff.

We have a program.

And, we have a director of development.

But, we have the resources that we can pull from Orange County where we have an executive director, development associate, and other program managers.

So, if we get too much, we can always pull from those resources.

- Right.

- They are ready to come up and help at any moment that would need it.

- Right.

So, tell us about, you know, you kind of look to and around the corner, what's next in financial literacy?

Like, where are we going?

What should kids and young people, and therefore facilitators in our society knowing about 'em, what are the things that we should know more about for the future to meet with the challenges that we'll see in tomorrow?

- I think one of the things that we are learning right now is we don't have a way to help with people filling out their FAFSA.

- Right.

Oh, my gosh.

- But, there is now a whole requirement by the State of California that every high school graduate needs to have their FAFSA application completed.

- Right.

- And, just us going in initially and meeting with these high schools we're like, "Okay.

I don't know how to do that, but I sympathize with you."

And, just helping the kids being able to understand the needs versus the wants, if you're at home.

Just working with your kids and learning as they grow.

- So, tell me about some of the things that you've accomplished recently that you're really proud of.

- So, we originally had a goal of just impacting 2,000 students in the Inland Empire.

'Cause our fiscal year ends in June.

So, we had a goal of 2,000.

We have hit over 12,000 students.

- [Joe] Oh, my gosh.

- We were able to get into like, eight additional schools this year.

- Right, sure.

- [Erin] In just a short time.

- Tell me about your development journey because you're the director of development and development means developing resources, okay?

You know?

You know, Junior Achievement!

"Hey, we need money."

Director of development!

Tell us about that journey and, you know, some of the related challenges that you see in doing that.

- So, some of the related challenges is right now just diversifying.

Getting away a little bit from the banking industry.

- Okay.

- But, seeing the value as far as if you were to invest in Junior Achievement- - Right.

- it's an investment.

Because you're investing in your future workforce- - Right.

- your future talent.

So, it's currently an expense, but it's not an expense because you're gonna have the talent afterwards.

They're gonna remember that company.

They're gonna remember that job shadow, that tour.

They're gonna remember you coming in.

So, the challenge is just saying that everyone can be a part of it and that everyone can support it.

And, actually, everyone has the responsibility to do it.

- Right.

Right.

Now, so you're talking about school growth.

That sounds like that's happening.

Does it happen because you get the district and with the district comes the schools?

Or, one of the schools gets excited and with that comes the district?

- Currently, it's one of the schools.

- [Joe] Right.

- I've-- We have in like, Anaheim with our Orange County office, they have an MOU with the district, and that helps.

Oftentimes, it starts out with just one teacher and the teacher just requests that we come into the classroom.

And then, from there we try to say, "Okay, who else wants to join?"

And then, we have multiple teachers.

Whereas our JA Day, we're gonna impact third through fifth graders and then next year we're gonna do schoolwide, kindergarten through fifth.

- Right.

So, how does that connect to globally, like, your current priorities?

Here are the things that are the most important for Junior Achievement to do right now.

- I think the most important is to just make as many connections as possible.

Especially, since there is a potential for California to have that financial literacy.

We are here to help those teachers fill that gap.

So, that they're not doing that extra work.

And, just being able to have the volunteers to be the faces of the community for the students.

Because it helps make the connection, going, "Okay, this is something I can do."

And, we've had recently where we've had some examples of people like Banner Bank and Citibank came in and they said, "This is why I got into banking.

"And, it was because my mom always waited for the one the teller that spoke Spanish."

- [Joe] Right, sure.

- And so, she didn't trust me to translate, a hundred percent!

- Right!

- But, she could always tell when I was wrong!

- Right!

(laughs) - And so, they were able to connect directly with the students.

And then, afterwards they even said, "Hey, send me your resume."

- Right, sure.

- "Let me look at your resume.

Let me help you tweak it and let me help you grow."

So, those were invaluable connections in those areas.

- And, speaking of which, let's see a JA Day in action.

We can check out volunteers and a student.

[light upbeat music] ♪ - Hi, my name is Sergio Quero.

I'm the Southern California market manager for the U.S. Community Relations team at Citi.

Today, we're at Ridgeview Elementary with Junior Achievement of Southern California.

Volunteers are inside the classrooms working with grades second through fifth grade.

And, we are embracing and promoting positive financial habits through the JA curriculum.

We have hands-on activities with students guiding them from understanding how money circulates within the city, providing them direction on starting their own business, and setting positive financial habits for their futures.

Junior Achievement is great because it helps promote positive financial habits to young students so they can develop to future bright stars.

I think having positive financial habits, being aware of how money is circulated, it's extremely important.

And, just for that same reason, to be ahead of the curve and not learn when you are facing perhaps a negative monthly budget.

Or, you're facing overextending credit card debt.

And, really being comfortable with the notion of following a monthly savings and spending plan, on always having smart financial goals, will only better yourself in the future for economic and financial mobility.

I think the kids really enjoy the change in pace from their weekly activities within school, having visitors come in and doing these wonderful interactive financial activities with volunteers.

I think children receive that in a very positive manner, and they can take what they learn today and build upon that in the future.

- Hi, I'm Parker!

I'm from Ridgeview Elementary and I'm in grade five.

Our Junior Achievement program is about entrepreneurship and what to do.

Like, so they prepare us for what's gonna happen in the future.

We have the skills to, like, create a business or maybe like treat your customers the right way.

It's preparing us for what's gonna happen in the future, and how to communicate with other customers and treat them well, not terrible.

So, in the future we're gonna learn about saving our money and also banking our money.

For starting your own business, you need to have skill, innovation.

You need to know what you're creating, like your products, or your, like-?

Maybe, like, business offers.

I mean, I really like it!

I mean, this is really cool and I hope this can continue, and I hope we can do this in the future.

[light upbeat music] ♪ - [Joe] Tell me about-?

You know, as a child, when my daughter was growing up, I tried to do things that encouraged financial literacy.

We, like, played "Cashflow for Kids" and things like that.

So, let me flip it around.

And, at the risk of asking something that might not even be a Junior Achievement question, what does a parent do that maybe figures out- maybe because their kid's in Junior Achievement- maybe there's some boxes that I should check.

You know, I come from a modest background.

You know?

Relatively simple, et cetera.

I've always dealt in cash.

I haven't dealt in credit at all.

What's available for folks like that?

Are there companion organizations or things like that?

- I believe there are.

But, that is definitely one of the things they keep asking us when we go in.

They go, "Do you do anything for adults?"

- [Joe] Really?

- So, one thing we've encouraged is why doesn't the parent become the volunteer in the classroom- - Sure!

- for that?

And, they learn alongside their students.

But, we have with our kids, the students get to take some of the resources home.

And, that does start the conversations at home and just starting to work, like I said, with your kids going, "What's a need versus a want?"

- [Joe] Right.

- Okay.

"Can we put this money away for an experience?

"Versus do we need to put it in for something we have to have right now?"

- Right.

Right.

So, I want to hear more about-- You've mentioned one of the programs where the kids are looking at credit in terms of getting a car, and down payment, and here's what your interest rate would be based on your credit score, and things like that.

Tell me more about those types of things.

Some of the projects and some of the things that the kids actually get a chance to start to deal with, that really gives them some hands-on in terms of dealing with money and credit issues.

- So, that one is our JA About Cars.

And, it's taught at the high school level.

And so, the kids, the students are going through it and the volunteer is able to bring in their personal experience on what they did on buying their car.

We teach 'em cash versus credit, versus financing and leasing.

And then, just to challenge 'em, it was sponsored by Honda Finance through a national grant.

And, they go in and they look at the Honda Finance website and like I said, they are able to toggle the switches.

And, I was learning alongside them- - Sure.

- even though I was the co-teacher.

And, I was like, "Oh!

Look what happens when we change "your credit score just a few points.

"How much does that down payment change?

How much that does that monthly payment change?"

When we do the kids in the classroom, the kids actually have manipulatives that they get to hold.

There's some of them that are actually money that they're playing with.

Well, it's Monopoly money!

But, they're getting to play with it.

They're getting to look at it.

As a teacher, I don't always have those resources in the classroom to be able to say, "Okay, this is what the difference between a dime and a nickel is."

- Right.

Right.

What are some of the misconceptions that you find?

Common misperceptions surrounding money?

I mean, it might be with the parents.

It might be like something that the kids thought they know at a basic level, but maybe they don't.

What are some of the things that we seem to steer around?

Maybe because we don't face it because we aren't realistic.

What are some of the things we're missing?

- I think it's ultimately credit card debt.

- Right.

- And, the students not understanding that when you have a credit card, it is there for a purpose and it's not just to spend hayward ways.

- Not money!

(laughs) - So, we were-- Yeah!

We were teaching them, some of the high schoolers that when you have your credit card, if you wanna use it, use it for your gas money, and then pay that off.

- Right.

- And, that's part of your monthly budget.

So, we were just teaching 'em responsibility on when they have a credit card.

And, it's always there if you do need those resources.

And then, the other part is they were teaching 'em, if you put away money starting-?

The more it'll grow if you put it in the bank versus if you put it under your mattress.

- Right.

Give us a resource wish list.

Some things that we could, that you could see.

"We would love to do more of this.

"This is the next thing.

This is the next frontier "that we really wanna meet.

If we had more in the way of resources, we would do-" What's that?

- So, I'm gonna go low to high!

- Right, okay!

Gotcha!

(laughs) - So, my low wish list is just volunteers.

- [Joe] Gotcha.

- Faces.

- Right.

- People that say, "I'm willing to go in and teach."

The other wish list is to sponsor a class.

- Yeah, sure.

- Sponsor a school.

My third is, long-term wish list, I would love to have a Finance Park and the company pop up in the Inland Empire.

- Right.

- So, Finance Park, the biz center?

It is usually a brick-and-mortar.

But, there's ways to do it mobile.

And so, that's a big campaign.

And, I want to have our students to have that experience to be able to go in with their credit, with a given credit score and to negotiate and to be an adult for a day.

- So, tell us about the volunteer opportunities that exist.

- So, use our-- We are a hundred percent volunteer driven.

So, we have the volunteers go in and become the teacher for the day.

And, it's not as intimidating as they think because we train you and you have a script.

You have a curriculum.

So, we need the volunteers to go into the classroom.

We need the volunteers to be career speakers that talk about their path because no one is usually like "this."

It's the ups and downs of- "Well, I went here and I went here.

I mean, look at me."

And then, you also-- entrepreneurs!

There's an entrepreneurship program and the entrepreneurs come and talk, and teach the students about entrepreneurship.

And, right now, every student wants to be an entrepreneur for YouTube, or influencer.

And-?

Okay, if that's their wish.

But, let's get 'em started in the right direction.

- [Joe] Right, sure.

- So, they know how to be smart business people.

- So, tell me about you.

You know, fortunately, we get to talk a little bit off camera or whatever else.

And, you've got an interesting journey going into education, being a teacher, doing other things in the nonprofit space and being passionate enough about coming out here.

And, you're a busy person and all these other things with family and everything else.

How do you get through a difficult moment?

Because we all have difficult moments, right?

You know what I mean?

So-!

But, you're this accomplished person that's gotta find a way to balance, right?

And, you're doing some things that are incredibly important.

But, when you get in the tough moments, how do you get through 'em?

- I have to usually just take a moment to get it outta my head.

- Right.

- 'Cause I'm my worst enemy!

- So-?

- Maybe a lot of us are!

- Yeah.

- You know?

- So, it might be just taking a walk.

It might be just taking a breather.

If I know I'm in a moment where I might lose my cool, it's walking away from it.

- Right.

- I can handle it under pressure.

- Right!

- [Erin] But, then when that call hangs up, it's like, "Okay?

(Joe laughs) I gotta go!"

So, just taking a walk and getting away from the situation and then coming back.

- Right.

- And, thinking it from a different angle.

- Right.

And, you said that you guys are starting to maybe-?

Are you starting to get more into political advocacy?

You know, a little bit just in terms of programs and is that necessarily kind of because California is one of the last people to "make it official?"

- Yeah.

So, we recently have pooled some of our resources and we are going advocating for the financial literacy standard, and also saying we're here to help those teachers.

So, we're asking California to push it through, to vote on it and say, yes, please have a standard in California for financial literacy.

- Look in the crystal ball for us.

And, as a, you know, nonprofit professional that has a good sense of the 30,000-foot view.

And, I'm sure as a development person, you gotta think of it that way.

Look 10, 15 years down the road and tell us that if you had your druthers, what is your organization doing?

What's happening in financial literacy and how is Junior Achievement helping facilitate it?

- So, what I do like is we have a great education team that stays on top of it and they're constantly revising the implementation standards.

They're constantly revising the curriculum and they're constantly trying to stay ahead of the game.

But, they're also working with industry leaders to be able to do this.

- Right.

- So, the industry leaders put their input in, put their feedback in.

And, one of the things we've just recently had to pivot is post-COVID, we had to expand it.

It stopped at high school, and now we've expanded to 25 year olds.

So, we're starting- - Oh, great.

- to go into colleges- - Right!

- to teach financial literacy- - Oh my gosh.

This is necessary.

- as well.

- [Erin] Yeah, I've seen it.

I saw the maturity change.

I saw everything change as a teacher.

- Right.

- And go, "Yep, this is what we need to do."

- [Joe] So, now we know Junior Achievement a little bit better.

Give us some homework!

How do people follow up and get more information and get involved?

- So, they can give us a call.

They can email me.

They can look us up online.

And, we're pretty easy to find.

- Thanks so much for being on with us.

- Thank you for having me.

- We want to thank you guys for watchin' us.

Want you to keep watching us.

Let folks know not only can they get all of these episodes at YouTube, but also they can get additional footage, things that you didn't see if you just watched the episode.

And, keep joining us as we go down the road, seeing all these wonderful organizations doing great work.

And, we'll do it one conversation at a time.

Until then, Joe Richardson for "Inland Edition."

Take care.

[uplifting music and vocals] ♪ ♪ ♪ [music fades]