The Botetourt County School Board recognized Breckinridge Elementary School fifth graders Jacey Walker and Nolan Linthicum for being regional winners in this year’s Stock Market Game at its meeting last Thursday.
Gifted Resource teacher Karen Busher introduced the students’ strategies for the competition. Students start the game with $100,000 to invest, and then the students select the stocks they want to purchase.
“Their portfolio grew in about three months from $100,000 to about $113,000,” Busher explained. “Most of the kids that start the Stock Market Game are real novices. They have very limited knowledge about the markets, so we just start with the basics.”
The students revealed that they invested in Lowe’s furniture store and the BioTech company. Both businesses had a busy 2020. One acted as a safe haven for newly awakened home decorators staying at home during the lockdown. The latter is one of the companies manufacturing what is arguably one of the most important vaccinations in modern medical history.
“It’s a really worthwhile program for all fifth graders to have some exposure to understanding that the markets exist and they really are for everybody and not just for some people,” Busher continued. “You don’t have to be extremely wealthy to start looking into investing. From our local banks and starting saving accounts to kind of looking into markets and how they can both have risk and reward—that’s a real important concept and I think the younger kids really start understanding those concepts by around the fifth grade. It’s a really great thing for all of them to have an opportunity to participate.”
The Stock Market Game is an online simulation of global markets where students in grades 4-12 learn about economics and investing wisely. According to StockMarketGame.org, nearly 20 million students have participated since 1977.
