In 2024, the poverty rate for Bullitt County was 10.6%, and although this poverty rate is lower than the national average for poverty (12.5%), the community wants our youth to be prepared with financial skills to fight poverty. According to the 2023 Community Assessment for Bullitt County, 12.6% of stakeholders wanted to see increases in youth career readiness and in youth life skills training, which included money management and life decision making.

Bullitt County 4-H partnered with the Family Resource Youth Services Coordinator for Overdale Elementary School and Maryville Elementary School to host the Dollars and Sense Program for current 3^rd and 4^th grade students using the Dollars and Sense Curriculum created by the University of Kentucky.

 Dollars and Sense is an experiential learning opportunity for elementary students to get an introduction to budgeting and economics. It is a “spin off” of the Reality Store program. During this program, students are given a $200 allowance and must budget and manage this money while visiting various booths to purchase items. There is also a “luck of the draw” booth where the students can see how unexpected costs can affect their monthly budgets. For both schools, students went through lessons over needs versus wants, budgeting basics, and financial goal setting. We utilized the North Bullitt High School students and parents to operate the booths as the students rotated throughout.

During this program, we had approximately 115 students, 30 volunteers, and the school administrative team and teachers who were participating or helping with Dollars and Sense.

After this program, we wanted to see students realize that proper budgeting is not always an easy task, that there is a difference between needed items and wanted items, and that making wise financial choices make it easier to stay within their budget.

Students were asked to rate their change in behaviors before and after the Dollars and Sense program for the following: 

1. Thinking about price of an item before purchasing: An increase of 26% would think about the price of an item before purchasing

When asked specifically something that they learned from this program, responses given by students were: 

1. “Items can be really expensive”
2. “Not everything is cheap and to save your money”
3. “Money is not unlimited”
4. “You should not spend money on things that you do not need”
5. “To make better spending choices”
6. “How to subtract money”
7. “You need to get the things you need before you get the things that you want”
8. “To make good decisions to spend money”
9. “I was surprised by the prices and to get stuff that you need before you get the stuff you want”