The State of New Jersey
 NJ Department of Banking and Insurance
search  

Home > Department Press Releases/Newsletters/Reports

News Release

New Jersey Department of
Banking and Insurance

Acting Commissioner Ken Kobylowski

For Immediate Release:
April 4, 2012

For Further Information:
Ed Rogan or Marshall McKnight (609) 292-5064


  Acting Commissioner Kobylowski Visits Capital One/
Junior Achievement Finance Park

NEWARK – New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance Acting Commissioner Ken Kobylowski yesterday visited the Capital One/ Junior Achievement (JA) Finance Park and urged students from Passaic County Technical Institute who were participating in the financial literacy program to take very seriously the lessons they were learning about financial responsibility and managing their money.  

“What you learned in this program you should use for the rest of your life,” Acting Commissioner Kobylowski said. “I can not stress enough how important it is for you to be smart about your money. The financial decisions you make will impact your career, your income, whether you can get credit, whether you can afford to buy a house and nearly every other aspect of your future. You should take the lessons you learned from this excellent program and start using them immediately in your everyday lives.”

Finance Park is the culmination of a four week financial literacy program taught at high schools across the state. On the final day of the course, students visit the Capital One/JA Finance Park hosted at the Verizon Building in Newark, where volunteers assist them in making simulated financial life decisions.

 
Acting Commissioner Kobylowski Visits Capital One/Junior Achievement Finance Park
From left to right, Junior Achievement of New Jersey President Catherine Milone, Assistant Division Director of DOBI's Office of Consumer Finance Patrick Mullen, student Forhad Mukith, student Osirianys Esquea, Acting Commissioner Ken Kobylowski, student Shana Deno, student Ormary Rojas, DOBI's Event and Education Coordinator Alaina Arce, and Allstate New Jersey Insurance Company Legislative and Regulatory Counsel Georgia Flamporis. Students are from Passaic County Technical Institute.

Students take on fictional jobs with incomes and debit cards and then embark on setting budgets that allow them to budget based upon the income they make. They visit various kiosks in the park that represent typical daily living expenses such as electric bills, groceries, housing costs, transportation, health care, home improvement, clothing, entertainment, emergency costs and other expenses.

“Experiential financial education helps students to understand the short and long-term impact of educational, financial and life-style decisions,” said Catherine Milone, President of Junior Achievement of New Jersey.  “It also prepares students to succeed as adults by teaching them some basic, practical money-management skills which they will need to help them prosper in life.”

Acting Commissioner Kobylowski and Banking Division Assistant Director for Consumer Finance Patrick Mullen gave brief remarks and observed students as they made their way through the various activities. Financial Literacy is an ongoing Department initiative, done in conjunction with the banking community, to educate high school students about financial basics. This includes creating a household budget; balancing a checkbook; how credit cards and bank accounts work; and how to avoid identity theft. During the past six years, the statewide Financial Literacy program has reached thousands of students from all 21 counties.

Capital One/JA Finance Park made its debut in Newark in February 2009. During the 2011 program, JANJ reached more than 3,000 students in northern New Jersey.

Junior Achievement of New Jersey is a non-profit organization dedicated to educating young people about business, economics and free enterprise. Through a dedicated volunteer network, JA offers in-school and after-school programs for students in grades K-12 including Financial Program which it conducts with DOBI and the business community.

###
 
OPRA
 OPRA is a state law that was enacted to give the public greater access to government records maintained by public agencies in New Jersey.
line
Adobe Acrobat
 You will need to download the latest version of Adobe Acrobat Reader in order to correctly view and print PDF (Portable Document Format) files from this web site.
state seal
Copyright © 2011, State of New Jersey
New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance