Home-Schooled Students Place Fourth

In Statewide Stock Market Game

A group of home-schooled students from Progressive Learning Center (PLC) got the good news last week: they placed fourth in a statewide mock stock market competition. The news came from PLC’s finance mentor, and Newtown resident, Valerie Principi.

Along with 117 other student groups across the state, PLC students participated in a six-week stock market game. The goal of the game was to come away with the best stock portfolio. Each team started out with $100,000 and had to buy and/or sell each week. The PLC team wound up with $155,730 in their portfolio; the third place team had $125,000.

PLC student Esther Benoit explained that each week the students would track stocks on the Internet newspaper at home and then get together to make their buy and sell decisions based on the information they had gathered. The best part of the game, according to student Nadine Conte, was “taking turns being team captain and then finding out where your team was each week on the ranking sheet.”

The one male student on the team, Paul Brunner, commented that they refused to buy stocks from companies that used child labor or were in some way harmful to the planet.

When asked what was the worst stock decision that had been made by the group, Jen DeWitt declared, “Selling Sysco was a major mistake!”

Mrs Principi explained that using the stock market game teaches students that anyone can invest, but there is risk involved. “One week they were ranked tenth and the next week they went down to ninety-two. But here they are at number four. I couldn’t be more proud,” she said.

The finance mentor also talked about the confidence that was gained and the teamwork that was strengthened through this endeavor. “Every student had to research on their own and state a reason why the group should buy or sell a stock.”

There were some heated stock discussions going on between these home-schooled students. But now that all is said and done, they can’t wait for next year’s game and the chance at first place.