(L-R) Ryan Sterling, Shaughn Thomas and Trynt Thomas at Lake Olympia Middle School.

Lake Olympia Students Learn to Invest in the Stock Market and in Themselves

ByMara Soloway

The ticker of mysterious numbers and symbols that move across the bottom of the screen of the financial news programs used to mean nothing to students Ryan Sterling and Trynt Thomas, who are both 14 and were eighth-graders in the 2017-2018 school year at Lake Olympia Middle School.

But thanks to participating in the after-school club called Invest in Yourself, the two became financially savvy enough to win a nationwide investment contest and earned a trip during spring break to see the home of American finance, Wall Street, for themselves.

Invest in Yourself was designed by teacher Shaughn Thomas (no relation to Trynt), who is the AVID coordinator at Lake Olympia Middle School and Fort Bend ISD’s District Teacher of the Year for 2018. He arranged for the boys and their families to go with him to New York City.

“In the club, they learn about financial literacy as a whole – topics like credit, debt and stock market,” Shaughn said. “I bring professional people in different fields like retirement specialists so the students can get experience from everybody.” Invest in Yourself students also give seminars to various groups in the community, which gives them experience in public speaking and as a teacher.

As part of Invest in Yourself, Ryan and Trynt teamed up during the school year to play The Stock Market Game™ and won first place out of 446 teams in the competition. Each team was given $100,000 of simulated money to invest. Ryan and Trynt turned their $100,000 into $147,000.

They’re a good team. Each is inquisitive; they sometimes complete each others sentences as the conversation flows. Each maintains a good GPA and is engaged in school activities. Trynt is past president of the student council and has athletic and academic awards. Ryan plays basketball and other sports and takes on the role of leader to students who need a friend. “I encourage people who are different so they don’t get left behind,” he said.

Both Ryan and Trynt admit they didn’t know much about investing or the economy before joining Invest in Yourself in the 2016-2017 school year. Over the nine-month period of The Stock Market Game this past school year, they began to put the language of stocks and investing to use and to perfect the teamwork involved. Ryan was in charge of selling stocks that weren’t doing well, and Trynt used the money to buy others as a result of long hours of research.

They also admit the strategy they used to add 50 percent more to their initial investment is too risky for long-term investments such as a 401(k) account. When they first started, they bought well-known stocks including Nike, Adidas and Amazon.

“As we got farther into the game we actually got smarter, and I was able to find certain things that made a profit. The stock that we found and invested in, Wins Financial Holdings (WINS), was doing good at the moment I found it so I put all the money into it,” Trynt said. He saw that the percentage at which it was gaining value was high – sometimes more than $100 per week – and its purchase cost was low, around $20.

By the time Trynt came across WINS, he and Ryan were in last place in The Stock Market Game. They used a risky strategy of investing heavily in one stock because “we really didn’t believe in ourselves,” Trynt said. “I thought the game was done.”

“We were doing bad so we’re like, what’s the worst that could happen?” Ryan said.

Shaughn went into the administrative end of the program and saw what the boys were up to. He was very impressed at the increase in value, but knew it wasn’t going to last. In fact, WINS has a much lower value now.

Luckily the strategy allowed the team to move into and hold on to the lead, which they celebrated with the trip to Wall Street.

The experiences in Invest in Yourself and the Stock Market Game opened Ryan’s and Trynt’s eyes to making money work for themselves and their families. Along with other students who were in the program, each has a custodial investment account in their parents’ names that will help secure their financial future.

Ryan and Trynt also took part in Shaughn’s entrepreneurship pilot program in which they wrote business plans for a business they actually could start now. They presented their ideas to two outside judges for cash prizes. Each placed in the top three. Ryan started a consignment company but finds he doesn’t have the budget for it. He’s fine with that; his philosophy is, “to eventually do it right, you have to fail to succeed.” Trynt’s idea was a water bottle that tells the pH of the water so you know it’s safe to drink.

They see financial independence as a good thing so they won’t have to always bother their parents for cash. In the future, Ryan thinks he will study business entrepreneurship in college and feels he will do well in business. Trynt has some other business ideas and likes the concept of working for himself.

The students will be ninth-graders at different high schools this coming school year: Ryan’s heading to Elkins and Trynt to Hightower. But this smart and savvy team plans to keep in touch and will carry on their involvement in school activities and monetary matters.

“We know what’s going on now,” Ryan said. “If we keep investing in the stock market, it will keep getting better and better.”

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Visit investinyourself365.com for more information on Shaughn Thomas’ Invest in Yourself program. His YouTube page is MrThomasInvest.

Ryan, Shaughn and Trynt visit the Wall Street bull during the trip they won to New York City. Ryan’s younger brother sits on top.

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