Valparaiso High School students and teachers will soon be getting a little help with those awkward growing-up talks— like how a credit score is formed and where loan application language comes from.
Starting this fall, Regional Federal Credit Union is launching a new Student Credit Union e-branch at the school. Students and teachers will be able to open savings and checking accounts, get debit cards, and learn financial responsibility.
"If you can do it at the branch, you can do it at the school," said Kevin Kosek, Regional’s Vice President of Marketing and Business Development.
Unlike Regional’s Student Credit Unions more traditional look at schools like Portage and Morton Township, with the familiar counters and dedicated conference rooms, all the banking at Valparaiso High School’s new e-Branch will be handled through computer tablets. The branch will be open two to three days a week, and staffed by one Regional employee and a team of student interns.
“Our motto is ‘for students by students,’" Kosek said. But, he said, banking access and job experience are secondary motivations for Regional’s presence at VHS. “The number one priority of the program will be financial literacy.”
The internships are a part of the credit union’s mission to educate the region’s young people on how to manage their money. Kosek’s team will partner with business, accounting, and finance teachers to develop presentations, supplementing existing state standards and requirements.
“We don't want to push our curriculum on to the teachers, we want to enhance the teachers' curriculum,” Kosek said.
One of their most popular presentations is on understanding credit scores. This lesson is so successful that students will take the information home and share it with their parents. Branches report having parents come to them to get more information and even enroll in Regional’s credit rebuilding program.
Regional opened their first Student Credit Union in Portage almost 40 years ago. In that time, they’ve helped kids get loans to grow small businesses, build savings into successful investment portfolios, and develop strong credit scores by avoiding unnecessary debt.
“Once we start educating the kids, I think it's going to make a better and a smarter society when it comes to financial issues,” Kosek said.
Regional FCU began as a teacher’s credit union, Hammond Educators, serving Lake County. In 1980, they merged with Portage Teachers and Employees Credit Union and expanded their charter into the northern part of Porter County. Today, Regional’s community charter enables them to offer membership to anyone who lives, works, or attends school or church anywhere in Lake or Porter County, and their families.
“Northwest Indiana, it's a good community,” Kosek said. “It's a good region to live in and to work in, to have a life in, and we're just trying to make it better.”