Hit TV Shows Spawn Summer Camps...

It was "The Apprentice" that spurred Gayle Reaume to open the Money Academy Camp in Austin, Texas. "I watched the Trump Show and realized how many people don't know diddly about money," she says. The camp's motto: "Tell your money where to go, don't wonder where it went. Have a plan to make it grow, before it all gets spent."

Full Article

A camp full of fun... and finance?

While other teens were at camp creating crafts or honing their sports skills this summer, my son, Jake, was (sometimes even gladly) going to work.

Full Article

Money camp gives kids itch to get rich

Gayle Reaume bears absolutely no resemblance to Donald Trump. Her eager-beaver entrepreneurs don't have BlackBerrys, tattoos, entourages or egos the size of Cleveland.

But Reaume accomplishes what "The Celebrity Apprentice" can only dream of: She makes learning about money fun for kids.

The Money Camp Teaches Kids about Finances

Campers learn to start business, handle money Austin American-Statesman February 14, 2009 Forget tents, lakes and campfires. At The Money Academy’s Grow Your Own Money Entrepreneur Camp, it’s all about cold, hard cash. During the course of a week, campers cook up a business idea, develop a marketing plan and analyze expenses and potential profit. Then they set up shop, peddling their services or wares to the customers lunching at the health food restaurant on Toomey Road. Full Article

Teaching Money Sense to Kids Early

Kids Become Profitable Entrepreneurs

Austin Camp Teaches Financial Skills

By Mose Buchele
KUT 90.5
March 11,2009

A lot of us ran a lemonade stand when we were younger, but how many designed a business plan?

It seems like everyone's mind is on their pocket book these days. Now the Money Academy is giving kids a very early start on the fundamentals of money management.

KUT Audio

Handling Money is Child's Play

Gayle Reaume of the Money Academy is teaching children money matters. “When kids have an understanding of how money works, they gain insight into their families’ financial realities.”

By Nancy Miller Barton
Austin Woman Magazine
March 11,2009

The word of the year for 2008, according to the American Dialect Society, was “bailout.” A picture may be worth a thousand words, but boy, does that one word speak volumes. For kids growing up today, hearing terms like “bailout,” “credit crisis” and “stimulus package” might sound like cacophony. We live in what Gayle Reaume calls “a consumption culture,” one where we tend to think, “we should be able to have everything we want … spend all your money and when you run out. Borrow more.” It’s the model our children may copy and yet, for many of them, the new economy means they can hear their parents’ wallets snapping shut. What they’re not hearing is anybody talking about why or offering ways to help. “We always want to make sure our kids are okay and comfortable and never have to worry about money,” says Reaume, “we don’t want them to worry about it … but they should know about it!”

“75% of parents now report they would rather talk to their kids about sex than about money,” says Reaume, who started the Money Academy here in Austin. She laughs, “They know about sex, they have children!”

full article