Banking at school?

My son, 7yo, just came home with a paper saying that 1st thru 5th graders are going to have an opportunity to open bank accounts and a representative from a local bank will be in school on certain weekday mornings to from 8-9am to accept deposits. Only deposits can be made, no withdrawals at the school. Withdrawals can only be made in person (both parent and child present) at the branch office of the bank. This is to teach children about financial responsibility and apparently is in conjunction with our State Treasurer (who's bucking for Gov.) and an Economic teaching initiative thru our local Univ.

Have any of your kids come home with a similar form?

The kid is to fill out the form (it specifically says that - since that's one of the things they'll be teaching) and the teacher witness the information for Homeland Security processing.

My first issue is I don't want my kid taking money to school to deposit in a bank account (that seems insane to me), the 2nd thing is I don't want the teacher using my kids info to fill out stuff for Homeland Security.

I haven't opened a bank account in a long time (but I do need to for my kids AND this is the bank that we use). Is it normal now to be vetted by DHS before being allowed to open one? It probably is. I know when we made settlement on my mother's house, DHS wouldn't release the money to my brother and I in one lump sum. It was released in installments over a period of about 1 month - about 10K at a time.

I wanted to know what your take was on the banking at school.

to make a small deposit every Tuesday. I really believe that
it is a great things when you can teach your kids how important it
is to save their money.

Every May, we could go downtown to the bank and check our balance
and make a withdrawal for something special.

I felt so important. I think that the Homeland Security issue
is nil, they have all that info anyway.

I felt so grown up. I looked forward to banking day every week.




Peace:thumbsup:

it doesn't go to anyone. Why would DHS have money from a real estate deal?

that Homeland Security put a hold on the funds. It wasn't alot - 52K split 2 ways. Heck, my BIL who sold the place was just paying off the rest of the 70K mortgage he had that was part of my Mom's estate. Now HIS checks I can understand them holding up a bit - he sold the house in 10 years time for an increase of 320K. He's still ticked because it all hasn't been released yet (they made settlement Sept 1st). The realtor said this was the first time he had heard of that rule so maybe it's something new.

agent handed me a certified check for the proceeds there was no DHS involvement.

edited to add: You should have never given up title to the property until you have been paid.

released. When we went to deposit them, we found we'd have to go thru another hold process and were told that only $2K would be available by the next banking day, the rest could take a week or two. My SIL and BIL deposited their checks (they had 2 cut also since this was a divorce issue), and were told that they would have the same 2K available the next banking day, but that their amounts were subject to the holds also. They were much larger amounts, so maybe that's why it's took them longer. Stupid BIL moved his money to a different bank, and they reissued the incremented hold. The reason he did it was becaue he switched banks from the one his exwife banked at. This was after the check for the total amount of the house was held up, then issued to the realtor ($390K) after 3:00 the day of settlement. I was thinking originally that the construction company that bought the house just wanted the money to stay in their account over the weekend.

over 10k are held like 5 working days. There's different hold times for 5k and 10k. They really should have given you certified funds, would have probably charged for it but not too much.


edit: And different banks have different rules, just an inherent risk with large check deposits.

When I graduated from high school, I had enough $$ to buy my college
wardrobe (no pants allowed until my junior year!).

Do they have a newsletter I can subscribe to?

decadent lifestyle of comic books and milk shakes.

I don't recall that they amassed any great amounts of money, but it was a good learning experience for them.

we don't need real banks making their commercial imprint (and that IS what is going on, or does someone really think banks are all of a sudden altruistically interested in education?) on children.

I wish I had had that advantage.

I agree with you that the school handling that information would make me uncomfortable. Students should be encouraged to setup an account to use as a teaching aid in class, but the account should be setup at the student and parent's bank of choice without the school's involvement.

I opened my first bank account (through a local bank) via my middle-school when I went into 6th grade. I thought it was really cool that I got free money out of it. I'd put in whatever portion of my allowance that I had left at the end of each week and usually had a decent return on it by the end of the year.

It's a great too for getting children interested in finance at an early age. I bet I'd be close to retirement today at age 33 if I had started saving even a small amount of money as a kid (I closed the account my senior year of high school, opened a checking account, and bought a car). Even though I pretty much wiped out the account when I graduated, it still taught me a lot about banking, interest and other financial matters. I still know people at age 33 who can't fill out a check or who don't have any idea what compound interest is.

I can think of all kinds of positives, and very few negatives that would come from this. I think when I opened my account I had to have two forms of ID and I think there was some sort of finger-printing thing they did too, but I didn't do it since I had been finger printed in elementary school.

If it's a local bank, you wouldn't have to take deposits to the school. Take them straight to the bank.

How did the DHS (Homeland Security, right?) get a hold of your money? I don't think it's their responsibility to actually HOLD the money.

As for your son's school, the paperwork is to make sure that their social security number matches their name.

The bank *is* a business, and this is just their way of snagging their customers young.

I don't know why the DHS is involved. Are terrorists depositing their evil money in their kids' accounts or something??

I don't ever remember that in our public schools - and I'm in Delaware. You know, the banking state ;) I do remember having a passbook savings account when I was a kid, but I don't think you can get these anymore.

on these accounts though.

If kids put $ 1 a week in their accounts, the bank loses money on the deal just doing the processing and mailing statements.

If a kid goes to Bank America when he's seven til he's 18, who's he gonna get his college loan from?

Like they do it out of their love of mankind....

Get them to think they can trust banks when they're young, and you've got them for a lot longer than that.

a partnership with A bank to do this. Administering a relationship with all possible banks seems like it would be unmanageable.

It just seems wrong for a bank to have exclusive access to all those potential customers via a public school. Maybe the school should start its own credit union?

Businesses often form partnerships with non profits. Though it certainly benefits the business as a marketing tool, I think it's up to the non profit to decide if its worthwhile or not. And in the case of schools, parental approval is necessary.

that in the 1950s. It is nothing new. It is a program to teach kids how to handle money.

It gives them exposure to how saving and the banking system works. I think its a great idea for kids to learn about saving. Why does the teacher have to witness this?

Do you ever send in money for your kids food? Obviously we would not send in $500, but if it is $10-50 you should be fine. It also teaches kids how to value money.

I was going to sign up to be a school teller in 6th grade, but the Feds shut down the programs because parents were "hiding" funds in their kids accounts and not reporting interest income. I'll never forget how disappointed I was not to have had that opportunity, but I kept the passbook active.

I signed up to be a crossing guard instead, and was crushed when I came in 2nd in the annual essay contest - the 1st place prize was a trip to D.C.

Then they stopped giving baseball tickets for straight "A" report cards...

I learned to stop chasing carrots that somehow vanish after the work was done. Carrots come, but mainly go. Over time, things never really changed all that much.

One should be mindful that when one closes accounts, many banks charge fees and they are not always "nominal." Sometimes low balance savings accounts are even subject to annual maintenance fees. Read ALL the fine print carefully. Only a penny or a few bucks saved can bring large penalties down the road to spoil the experience. Good work and saving don't count if *Co wants to destablize your future.

it was a real eye-opener when I recently had to open an account at a credit union. Big Brother wants to know what you have & where you keep it. :grr:

dg

It encourages saving money. That is usually want it is for saving money, they used a well known bank and
used a classroom and the deputy head as the bank teller with a volunteer pupil or two to assist, who like and excuse once a month not that have to play in the cold at lunchtime.

A real bank would invite identity theft. A most unsavory situation.

I'd open up one at the nearest credit union and have my kids use that instead.