Polley Makes Career Day Presentation To Students

SAN DIEGO, CA (Monday, March 06, 2006) - Grabbing the attention of a group of 20 second graders is no easy task but Fiducial senior business advisor Gene Polley managed to do that and more during a recent career day presentation at Jerabek Elementary School in San Diego, CA.

As part of Fiducial's "Adopt A School" program, company offices have adopted schools in their area and are working to promote increased involvement in the educational systems and support for future business leaders. One of these types of activities involves giving a classroom career day presentation which Polley did for an enthusiastic group of seven and eight-year-olds that included his son, Aaron.

"The kids were surprisingly interested and attentive," said Polley who works out of Fiducial's office in San Diego. "I gave them all $100 in play money and then had a little budgeting exercise for them. They were supposed to divide the money up among housing, food, fun and taxes categories."

First of all, Polley had to explain what taxes were to the youngsters.

"I told them taxes were used to pay for things like the school, roads, the parks, their teacher's salary and for the salaries of policemen and firemen and that really set in," he said.

Polley was impressed by the way most of the students budgeted the money with taxes.

"Most of them had 10% to 30% allocated for taxes but one kid had 50%," he said. "He's obviously going to be paying the self-employment tax."

Kids interested in money

Many of these future taxpayers were also aware that when they buy something that costs a certain price, they have to pay more than the price that's listed.

"I explained that was sales tax," he said.

The students asked a lot of questions because they were mostly interested in money. Some of them even wanted to know how to print their own money. That's when Polley explained the term "counterfeiters" to them.

When he asked how many students planned to go to college most of them raised their hands. After their response, he noted that he helps individuals like their parents budget their money which includes preparing for college expenses and they all seemed to understand. He gave the kids a $25 certificate to take home to their parents for a discount on their tax returns.

Polley says Aaron was "really happy" that his father spoke at the school. It seems that his son is well-versed in money matters.

"He is very money-oriented," said Polley. "He counts his money every morning. He gets paid an allowance every day for the Bank of Aaron. We let him buy his own toys and we're fairly generous with his allowance."

Due to Aaron's deep pockets, Polley joked that "it's really nice having all that cash available because your kid always has change for the babysitter."

Reading holds the key

The career day presentation was a result of the teacher sending out an email asking parents if they would be willing to explain their vocations to the class.

"She wanted to explain the training involved and the fact that this was something that required a college degree and that reading was very important in college," he said.

Recalling his college years, Polley told the kids that it took "a lot of studying" to get through the "very big books but the better the reader you were the quicker you could cover the subjects."

This was the first time he's given this type of presentation but he thoroughly enjoyed it.

"I was a little apprehensive about tackling this since I'm a kind of straight-laced, practical sort of guy," Polley said. "It was nice taking on a different speaking challenge."

In his presentation he was able to be informative and entertaining at the same time.

"It was fun to do," he said. "I got 20 of my discount coupons out to people that I otherwise would be unable to reach."

On discussing his career, Polley thought it was helpful to the kids because this is a quality profession for them to aspire to.

"I don't feel bad leading them into accounting," he said.

View all Fiducial Press Releases

This article has been read 204 times.

Printed From:
http://www.thefranchisemall.com/news/articles/14651-0.htm