PROVIDENCE – “What do you want to be when you grow up?” The question is a classic, but for children in middle school its answer is usually an abstract concept. What does being a police officer or judge or shop owner really entail? And, what does it mean to work for a paycheck and pay bills?
Most people learn these things the hard way, through the trials and tribulations of entering the work force after completing school, but for many local students the answers to these questions and others have recently become much more concrete.
Eighty students from Woodlawn Catholic Regional School in Pawtucket and the Jewish Community Day School in Providence joined thousands of local students who have participated in the Exchange City program housed at the Johnson & Wales University campus on Narragansett Blvd.
The program requires students to do weeks of preparation work in their classrooms and then come to Exchange City for an entire day when they “take over the city.”
The city is really the upstairs of one of the university’s buildings. Upon entering, visitors see several rooms designed to look like the buildings of a city – shops, a bank, a restaurant, a courthouse and even a newspaper, situated around a grassy (or, more specifically, astro-turfy) town green. The first thing visitors will likely notice, though, is the music. It’s loud, the way middle school students like it, and is interspersed with ads for the local businesses and announcements for the citizens of Exchange City. Who’s in charge? Sixth, 7th and 8th graders – who in fact are at the controls of nearly everything here.
Jennifer Keane, an 8th grade student at Woodlawn, is wondering how soon the bank where she is an account manager will be inundated by students trying to cash their second paychecks of the day. “We’re only allowed to give them $2 each,” she said. But, like the tellers at many real banks, she is frustrated that her customers don’t always understand what she needs to do. “The point is to teach them how to manage their money,” Keane said. The students, who all have jobs in Exchange City, receive paychecks throughout the day and have to deposit money into their checking accounts, write checks and manage to pay their bills throughout the day.
Before taking over Exchange City, each student filled out job applications and wrote a resumé. They also had to obtain letters of recommendation from their teacher, principal and classmates. They were interviewed by teachers and eventually all of the positions in the city were filled. Each business had students from both schools working together, since making new friends is another important part of the experience.
The opportunity to meet students from another school was like icing on a cake for Veronica Procopio, the principal of Woodlawn. “Every single shop has Jewish and Woodlawn kids,” she said, “so they have to work together.” The students from both schools had met once before, during a final training day held at Woodlawn school. Procopio described their lunch break when the Catholic students had said a traditional grace before eating and the Jewish students recited their traditional grace after the meal.
“The two cultures merged for the day,” she said. Procopio and the other teachers hoped that the cooperation between the students would lead to more understanding of each other’s religions. Vanessa Zoleta, an 8th grade student at Woodlawn and the Exchange City finance manager, said that the Jewish students she had worked with were “really nice.”
As for their jobs, like in the real world, not every student is in the job of their dreams. “I probably wouldn’t want to be a teller,” said Keane, the bank’s account manager. Her co-worker for the day, Ayrton Amado, a 7th grade student from Woodlawn, said he would consider doing the job in the real world. But, he added, if the stress he experienced at the bank of Exchange City was any indication, life at a real bank would probably “be like a mad house.”
Most students were enjoying their jobs. Cameron Brenner, a 6th grade student from the Jewish Community Day School, was a member of the Exchange City police force, but he has higher aspirations for himself. “I?think I might [become a police officer], before I become the first Jewish president,” he said.
He and the rest of the Exchange City police force were assigned to uphold a series of laws – from no running or gum chewing to keeping work stations clean. Violators, and there were a few, were brought into the city’s courthouse in front of Judge Daniel Brandes, a 6th grade student from the Jewish Community Day School.
One controversial case he heard involved a hot glue gun that was left unattended at one of the shops. An officer hauled one of the workers in, who testified that he had not left the gun unattended; instead, he accused, it was one of his co-workers. Eventually, the judge ruled that the crime’s real perpetrator had to be brought before him and he was fined $2.
The position of city judge, like that of Mayor Ashley Galvao, an 8th grade student at Woodlawn, was one that Brandes had to be elected to by his fellow Exchange City citizens. His platform included his ability to be fair and memorize all the laws. Mayor Galvao, meanwhile, was swamped in a pile of paperwork. “I think I expected it to be a little easier, but it’s real,” she said while signing a stack of billing forms and juggling notebooks full of forms.
The students working at one of the several stores in Exchange City – the Nature Shop that specializes in homemade earthy trinkets, the International Shop that sells trinkets with global flair, and the Sports Shop that provides Exchange City citizens with sports memorabilia – have to take out business loans to finance their shops’ opening, loans that have to be paid back by the end of the day. “It’s a lot different than I thought it would be... it’s real business,” said Ashley Polack, an 8th grade student from Woodlawn who was managing the International Shop. She and her co-workers were busily strategizing a way to increase their revenue – selling raffle tickets for a set of green maracas. Zachary Capela, a 7th grade student from Woodlawn, was one of those co-workers. As a product designer he was in charge of creating the merchandise that another student sold at their counter. The experience was teaching him “the values of working,” he said.
In addition to learning about business loans, the students all had pretend checking accounts they were responsible for keeping track of. They learned to write and endorse checks, pay bills for their businesses, buy and sell products and pay employees. “I think they understand their parents’ stresses
and I think they understand why their parents come home tired at the end of the day,” said Procopio.
Her husband, Ron Procopio, was one of many volunteer adults facilitating the Exchange City takeover. He is an organist and music teacher at St. Margaret parish and was naturally assigned to oversee the radio station, to answer questions and make sure things ran smoothly. The students at the radio stations were doing well, he reported, “They’re making money, which is the idea of it,” he said. “This is better than any of the book learning.”
Ken Fish, the director of Exchange City, agrees. “The kids can practice all kinds of roles here without consequences,” he said, “We give them the opportunity to assume these roles and responsibility of these roles in a safe environment.”
He sees the interactive and practical experience of Exchange City as the antidote to budget constraints that have cut many school programs. “One of the consequences of the ‘No Child Left Behind’ has been the narrowing of the curriculum... with the emphasis on test scores,” he said. “In high schools the push is to focus on the academic” instead of the practical and life skills that Exchange City’s curriculum focuses on.
“The need hasn’t been eliminated, just the instruction,” he added.
Exchange City opened in May and from then until the end of the last school year nearly 4,000 students, mostly in middle and high school, have passed through its doors. Fish expects to see more than 8,000 students this school year. The Providence Exchange City is just one six nationwide and is an outgrowth of the Portsmouth, NH location. “Not only are we the newest, but we are the biggest and the best,” said Fish as he surveyed the scene.
It may have been chaotic, but it was clear that real problem-solving was going on. One shop had decided to take special orders for customers to boost their revenues and at the bank a police officer was stationed out front to keep order during the second rush of paycheck-cashing. Solving problems “in context” is something Fish is proud to be able to teach students at Exchange City.
Soon, there will be a scientific counterpart to the business-oriented Exchange City. Earthworks is a similar program, but instead of preparing for the workforce, students prepare to do scientific research and conduct experiments in one of several different environments. What they won’t know until they get there is that a natural disaster has thwarted their plans – hopefully, more contextual problem solving will ensue.
Elana Riffle, a math and science teacher at the Jewish Community Day School, saw the benefits of the program for her students. “We prepared for it, but they never know what’s going to happen,” she said.
Procopio was glad to be able to teach her inner-city students “the real way” to make money, before they encountered the sometimes-tempting economics of the streets. “The younger they’re exposed to the correctness of life the better,” she said
