Springdale students capture 1st place, valuable skills in stock market game

Before entering Nick Spehar’s economics class at Spring­dale High School, Casey Sprinkle wasn’t sure what the difference was between the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ.

Now, at the end of the year, he and two of his peers, Shane Parsons Jr. and Owen Scheuring, are budding stock market experts.

Sprinkle, Parsons and Scheuring, all seniors at Springdale, placed first in The Stock Market Game out of 501 teams in Western Pennsylvania. The two-month game is a simulation of stock trading. Students start with a mock $100,000 and work the stock market to have the most money by the end of the two-month term, Spehar said.

The trio ended with $127,000, beating the second-place team by $370.

“It shows how fast and how quickly you can win money, or lose money,” Scheuring said. “It can jump one day and plummet the next.”

The team’s 27% return on investment would be envied by real investors.

Historically, the stock market produces about a 10% annual return, depending on market fluctuations, according to NerdWallet.

“This is a real introduction to a lot of our students,” Spehar said, “giving students knowledge of the stock market and investments. And, hopefully in the future, they can use it to their advantage.”

In that regard, Spehar might be fighting an uphill battle.

American youth often lack basic financial literacy, according to the Global Financial Excellence Literacy Center at George Washington University.

Data on financial knowledge among millennials show alarming trends, according to a recent survey the center conducted. Millennials show the lowest financial literacy among all age groups, with only a quarter demonstrating basic financial literacy.

• Only 8% are highly financially literate.

• 30% overdraw their checking accounts.

• 42% had used an alternative financial service such as payday loans, pawnshops, auto title loans or tax refund advances in the past five years.

• More than 20% with retirement accounts had taken out loans against those accounts or used hardship withdrawals in the prior year.

The financial plight of many high school graduates is one of the reasons Spehar gets his students involved with things like The Stock Market Game.

“It’s important so they can create wealth in the future and pass this knowledge along to their children.”

Students play the game on a mobile phone app or on the game’s website, Spehar said.

The game, from the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association Foundation, is free and used by teachers across the country. A 2009 study of the impact the game has on students by the FINRA Investor Education Foundation found students engaged in the game develop better academic performance, financial knowledge and saving and investing habits.

“It’s in real time. You’re playing the stock market,” Spehar said. “If you picked Microsoft (stock) and Microsoft goes up in real life, you’re making money.”

Parsons said their team spent most of their money the first day and used Google and Yahoo Finance to look at stocks that were hot. The trio invested in iShares Bitcoin Trust, which was their biggest hitter.

“We tried to diversify as much as we could, but most of them were technology-based, because that’s the hottest in the market,” Parsons said.

Spehar said he gives students free reign in what they choose to invest in or sell.

“Because it’s a two-month game, they can invest aggressively,” he said, “but, in real life, you’ve got to be more cautious.”

Sprinkle said he learned how to read stocks and follow sales through the game. Parsons said the game provides a better understanding of investing for real life.

“This game has shown me that, when I turn 18, I need to invest, and the stock market is a tool I can use,” Sprinkle said.