Stock Talk: Teens Start "Investeen" Club for Kids

California High School has a new group of investors - and many of them can't even vote for the school board.

Club Investeen, created by freshman Zahra Siddique, is Cal's latest addition to a long list of academic clubs. Zahra, who at 14 already owns her own retail website, started the club with "an ambition to bring entrepreneurial awareness and learning about stocks and other innovating ideas [to] teens."

Twice a month, members engage in mock stock trading, investing activities and competition using the website Updown.com. Students are able to trade in real time with $1 million in stock trading and "power money" as well as create profiles to make friends.

Club Investeen now has approximately 40 members, most of whom are underclassmen, and has become not only a viable method of education, but a way for like-minded students to make friends.

"I love it because I'm learning a lot," said Vice President Courtney Carlson. "I wanted to join because I think it's a great opportunity to gain important investing skills for the future, especially with today's economy."

Recently, self-starting blogger Bill Belew spoke to the club about the entrepreneurial aspects of his half-dozen websites.

"Had I said this to their parents, they wouldn't have a clue what I was talking about," said Belew. "Kids have a sense of social media, they're more receptive to this sort of thing."

Belew said that such a large group of young entrepreneurs may be a sign of the times. As technology has become more pervasive and the economy more dire, youths are more economically aware and enterprising.

"There's always a young business group, it's just a different era and a different model," Belew said. "They all want to know how to get something started." 

Club adviser and Cal High economics teacher Doug DeVries also said that the students in Club Investeen represent a new breed of business-minded teens.

"They want to learn how to profit in a variety of ways, and they tend to want to in a futuristic way, which is different for this age group," he said.

While most of their peers may be more concerned with short-term monetary gains for clothes and movies, both Zahra and Courtney said they believe learning to manage money is a skill they're happy to have developed at a young age.

"It is also important to see the long-term effects of investing wisely and finding creative ways to stay financially afloat," Courtney said.

While she plans on taking a hiatus from the club over the summer, Zahra is working on garnering the interest of the rest of her peers.

"I'm still struggling to ignite real interest in my member community to get serious about the club objectives," said Zahra. "It's a four-year process for me. I'm thinking of having some friends start it in other schools. Once it gets known for being successful it'll start being more popular."

Zahra is also developing a database called Adult Skills for Teens where adults can list their skills and expertise for students who want guidance from business professionals. She hopes that the database will draw more interest to her club next fall.

For more information on Club Investeen, visit www.investeen.net.