Aspen's Blog

At the end of each year, most of us spend some time reflecting on who we were when the year began, and who we are as it comes to an end. And if we're honest with ourselves, we take a look at the good, the bad and the ugly. And if we're really honest, we spend some time reflecting on our finances.

As we started writing the AEI curriculum, we understood that this was about more than just our students. Our teachers and parents would need to be all-in as well. We also knew that this would be a difficult task because money is a sensitive, personal subject. So much so that finances are the second least talked about topic within families behind sex. From all the research I've done on the topic, parents fear they don't know enough about finances themselves to share with their kiddos, and the same goes for teachers. Most elementary and secondary teachers did not go to school to teach financial education.

So we started out by offering our teachers some support in the financial world so they could not only feel more confident professionally on the topic, but personally. This school year we offered each of our faculty and staff members an opportunity to meet with financial advisor Wendi Strom. The response was overwhelming! Every slot was filled within a day's time, and we added more time slots so even more faculty and staff could have a chance to meet with her. Her initial visit was free, and she spent, on average, about an hour with each person.

One teacher said, "It went really well and was well worth our time. She gave us some action steps to work on, along with some resources and contacts. She set us up with someone who can help us with paying off student loans; we are meeting with that person this week. I was waiting for her plug on wanting our business, but that never happened, which was great. She emailed us a detailed synopsis of our meeting, which was also great. I don't have anyone to compare her to, but I'd recommend her! My wife also really appreciated that she works specifically with women and gave us referrals to females in her network."

Another noted, "I would highly recommend it. Very helpful. No pressure for further services. Based on our meeting we determined we need to update our living will - that was our first priority. She also gave us some ideas to maximize on our college savings plan. She gave us some great referrals for a few things we had questions on, too."

And another stated, "Wendi was amazing!!! She was super helpful, compassionate, honest, real and genuine. She followed up with resources, a plan, helpful guidance and future suggestions."

So many Aspen staff members have shared how great it was to sit down and put some work in on themselves and their families. They've shared with me that they are setting some financial goals and resolutions for 2018, which is incredibly inspiring and awesome!

So, as we reflect on where we are headed in 2018, I offer you an opportunity to reflect on your personal finances, share what's appropriate with your children and inspire them to start taking an active role in your family. There is no better time than now to start.

Click here for more information on how to set up a meeting with Wendi Strom.

If you walk into a classroom during Money Monday or Finance Friday over the course of the next few weeks, you'll witness the hustle and bustle of creative thinkers, planners and doers in action. It might look like chaos and sound like noise, but these are innovators at work! Developing a business isn't always clean or quiet. It can get messy and loud and feel a little out of control – that's just the excitement of ideas permeating the room.

Many of you know what it's like to bring a business from a thought to a thing. Many of you know what it's like to feel the excitement of creating something from nothing. Our students are in that space right now. What better time to show them what's possible than now! Denver offers so many different opportunities for entrepreneurs and start-up businesses to forecast growth in their businesses by offering spaces to sell.

Avanti Food and Beverage, located in the LoHi area, is a prime example of this. Avanti houses seven eateries under one roof, each separately owned and each signed to short-term leases of various lengths to encourage turnover and variety. It also encourages entrepreneurs to test their potential restaurant concepts to see if people are interested in what they are selling before making the huge leap, and investment, into a standalone restaurant.

The Denver Flea, the Horseshoe Market, YouthBiz Marketplace and TheBigWonderful are a few places to get inspired with your entrepreneurial ideas, and if nothing else, you can help support other small businesses. I encourage you to take your kids to these events, let them ask questions and get inspired by other entrepreneurs. Not to mention, these are super fun events!

Click here to learn more.

The Lower School STEAM Lab bursts with excited children who are coding a robot named Dash. It's just one of many engaging science, technology, engineering, art and math activities Kelsey Sullivan teaches in this incredible new learning space.

The lab is bordered with computers and materials, leaving the bulk of the room open. Kids sit on the floor watching Sullivan's instruction as she guides them step-by-step on her expectations and starting their project. Her goal for today is that by working with Dash, the kids will be learning problem-solving, collaboration, math skills and coding.

Kids can't wait to get started on the first challenge. Their task is to make Dash go around the border of a blue square of tape on the carpet. To do this, they'll need to program a sequence of moves, estimate distances and determine turn angles. Sullivan explains that yesterday's coding puzzles laid the foundation for this activity.

Each team member in the small groups has a job. The energy is contagious. They dive right into the first coding challenge.

Several challenges later, the kids get to attach a bulldozer type pusher onto their robot. For this task, they'll program Dash to pick up three LEGOs inside the square and push them to the edge.

Sounds like fun, right? It is! Kids are loving every second of it.

Sullivan teaches classes in the STEAM Lab two days a week. Classes rotate through every five weeks.

The other days, teachers can bring their classes to the lab. Since all the Lower School teachers are trained on the STEAM Lab materials, they can bring their classes any time. You'll usually see Kindergarten there on Fridays when they work with Bee Bots robots.

Teachers can also request that Sullivan help them integrate STEAM into units of study. She's been helping third grade with their unit about geographic regions, so the kids use their coding skills to show what they've learned. They'll program the robot to travel on a large map, stopping at each region to share the features of that area.

If you haven't seen the new STEAM Lab, head up the ramp and look left where the school store used to be. It's a wonderful space that already is enriching the lives of our Aspen Academy students.

Guest Blogger Melissa Taylor from imaginationsoup.net