Mary Miller is retiring from USD 397 Centre K-12 School in central Kansas after a 25-year teaching career. She taught Personal Finance for six of those years. Read her reflections on engaging lessons, classroom memories, and how being a part of the NGPF network helped her teach with confidence.

What is one of your earliest money memories?

One of my earliest money memories is getting money from my parents to go to a skating party for school. They gave me some money for a snack and/or drink and instructed me to always keep a dime in my pocket for a pay phone call home if I needed it.

Describe your school and the size, location, and community where it is located. 

I taught in a rural school that serves six very small communities. Most of our students come from farming families and we have a very strong agriculture program in our school. We are a PreK-12 school that just opened an on-site Day Care because there was no place for working people in our area to take their babies up to three or four years old. We were in danger of losing good teachers due to no child care in the area.

What other classes did you teach? And what age were your students?

I spent 17 years teaching middle school math before I became a middle school and high school business teacher. I also taught middle school Language Arts and middle school history.

What were your favorite topics to teach? And activities to use?

My favorite topics to teach were budgeting and I loved NGPF’s Bean Game. I also enjoyed taxes and loved the NGPF Move activity that helped show the students where their tax dollars are spent. I enjoyed teaching credit because of the activities that showed students how to save money on interest and avoid late fees and other “hidden” charges.

What makes you passionate about personal finance education?

I am passionate about personal finance education because I did not learn it in school and had to learn some money lessons the hard way. I truly wish personal finance had been a class when I was in high school. I enjoy showing students how they can make better financial choices and how those choices will have such big payoffs in the future. Seeing those “ah ha” moments for them is so exciting to me. Many students had no idea that predatory lenders were so prevalent or what made them so bad. I always heard from some students in class that they had no idea those check cashing places or payday lenders were charging such high interest rates.

As you head into retirement, what advice do you have for other personal finance teachers? 

As I head into retirement, my best advice for other personal finance teachers is to take advantage of all of the free resources NGPF has to offer! I never felt like my time in an NGPF sponsored PD was wasted. I always left with so many new resources or so much great information that helped me to be a better personal finance teacher. My students enjoyed the videos, the arcade games, and so many of the other activities and resources that I can’t encourage others to take advantage of the offerings of NGPF enough.

What is one of your favorite teaching memories from your career?

One of my favorite teaching memories from my career is watching each class try to budget with their 21 beans and then being told that they had to cut back for some reason and only had 13 beans to “spend.” Some really struggled with decisions on where and how to cut back. They all seemed to manage it in the end; but it was fun to listen to their thought processes.

Can you provide an example of how a lesson taught in class helped a student and/or someone in their family make a better money decision?

I had several students who were spending their money freely online and didn’t seem to save anything. It was interesting to watch their attitude toward money change as they gained more information about how to pay for college, how to stay out of deep debt, and how to plan for retirement and calculate what they might need. 

Do you hear from past students? If so, what do they say about having taken your class?

The past students that I hear from have been so thankful that they took my class. Some have said they were better prepared for college budgeting; others have made better choices in buying their first car; while others have even made their first house purchase after thinking (prior to my class) that was something they would never be able to do.

How has being part of the NGPF network helped you personally? Professionally?

Being part of the NGPF network has helped me personally because it has helped give me a better understanding of investing and insurance. Professionally, the NGPF network helped me because they keep the curriculum current and up-to-date so I don’t have to do it myself all of the time. They also have resources like the “paper napkin” graphics that help to explain some difficult concepts in terms the students understand. 

Is there anything else about you, your school, or your personal finance journey that you would like us to know?

I can’t thank NGPF enough for all that they do to provide quality curriculum with engaging activities and with PD that goes along with the curriculum so teachers are better equipped to tackle this subject with confidence. I am eternally grateful to have found such an incredible resource so full of positivity and so willing to share such a wealth of knowledge with others. I don’t think there was a single lesson that didn’t benefit my students in some way.

About the Author

Hannah Rael

As NGPF's Marketing Communications Manager, Hannah (she/her) helps spread the word about NGPF's mission to improve the financial lives of the next generation of Americans.