Before they go off and make futures for themselves, three Oxford High School students are trying to help out some younger Wildcats when it comes to understanding the almighty dollar.

Seniors Chloe Allen and Anna Peruski along with junior Sarah Tyrrell used their group project for Oxford High’s DECA, or Distribution Education Clubs of America, class to teach fourth-graders about finances. DECA clubs operate across the country full of high school and college students who want to break into the world of business.

Right now, Allen sees herself pursuing a future in finance and Peruski and Tyrrell have their eyes on business degrees. Because their interests are finance related, they felt like they could show the younger students a thing or two.

“Our DECA project is to make the (community) of Oxford financially literate and try to bring that into all grade levels,” Allen said. “We targeted the fourth-graders at Clear Lake as our main focus group. So, what we did was plan a bunch of fun activities for them to do that would help them with finance situations in ways that they could understand.”

The ladies visited teacher Melissa Peruski’s fourth-graders for five weeks and taught them about money, advertising and more. Melissa is Anna’s mother.

They used a curriculum put together by Junior Achievement and, with the help of their teacher Steve Ruch, came up with activities to supplement the lessons.

“The activities we did were more relatable, we related it back to them through real world situations in their lives,” Peruski said. “So it wasn’t just (about) what will happen, but what is happening now and what you can do right now.”

One of the ways they taught the kids about saving money was giving out DECA Dollars. The students could purchase small things like candy with the fake money, but could earn a little bit of interest if they held onto it.

“If they chose to save their money they could earn five (DECA) dollars in interest, which encouraged them to save,” Peruski said.

Peruski and Tyrrell recalled one of their students, Dalton, using what he learned from them about false advertising when looking at his breakfast cereal.

“He was eating Frosted Mini Wheats and on the box,(the cereal) was shown coated in frosting,” Peruski said. “But when he was eating them, some had a lot and some had a little. So he applied that to his life, which was cool.”

They ended their five weeks with the kids with a party complete with personalized awards for each student. Their fourth-graders looked forward to seeing them over that five week period, and the ladies were visibly gratified to have helped the next generation.

“We did this fun little ‘lights out, shout out’ where we turned out the lights and had a disco ball,” Tyrrell said. “They were given certificates, but they were also given cute little things to describe them… They really got a kick out of that.”

The ladies had more than a good grade on their minds and hope when these young students make their way to Oxford High and beyond, they have a better understanding of how to use and save their money.

“People go to school and they learn how to do algebra, but they don’t know how to pay off their mortgage,” Allen said. “So, I think helping people at an early age just kind of get those principles so that they can use them and they can say it was useful, (that’s) what motivated us in helping the community of Oxford. Because if they know, it makes the whole community better as well.”