Melrose Resident Teaches Local Kids "Money Matters"

Submitted by Mills & Company.

Cambridge Savings Bank and Central Square Theater (Cambridge) have teamed-up to tackle the lagging financial literacy rates of teens through a unique new play project called “Money Matters.”

Produced and performed by Central Square Theater’s Youth Underground teen theater ensemble, and developed in partnership with Cambridge Savings Bank, “Money Matters” provides an interactive and creative way to engage youth audiences in a dialogue about money and financial education.

Maggie Moore Abdow of Melrose is Youth Underground’s Education Director.

To create “Money Matters,” Youth Underground members and staff went through a series of the bank’s signature CSBsmart financial education lessons and interviewed each other, family, friends, neighbors, community leaders, and financial experts on topics related to budgeting, saving, managing bank accounts, credit, fraud, and more.

With script consultation from the CSB financial education team, the knowledge they gained during their own lessons, and the anecdotes they obtained from interviews, Youth Underground finalized a script that uses the experiences of REAL PEOPLE – real students, bankers, government leaders, teachers, parents, business owners, and community members.

The show runs for approximately 50 minutes and is followed by a “talk back” session with Youth Underground actors and staff.

Following the opening weekend, Youth Underground will take “Money Matters” on the road to visit local schools and deliver their important message.

The Youth Underground Ensemble is a theater training and performance program whose goal is to create theater – in tandem with community-based organizations – that connects with and speaks to issues of community and youth.

In late 2010 Cambridge Savings Bank, inspired by a crisis they saw in the communities they serve of a lack of financial literacy (highlighted by the subprime mortgage crisis), decided their financial education programs needed full-time attention.

They hired a long-time bank employee to be their new “financial education program manager” and began proactively soliciting local schools and nonprofits to see if they might be interested in having their group receive a series of customized lessons in finance from the bank’s trained presenters. Throughout 2010 - 2011, CSB has conducted more than 260 financial education sessions for 4,300+ participants of all ages and background (from kindergarten children to homeless war veterans) through their CSBsmart program.

For ticket and show time information please visit: www.centralsquaretheater.org.

About Cambridge Savings Bank

Cambridge Savings Bank is a full-service financial institution with $2.2 billion in assets. As one of the oldest and largest community banks in Massachusetts, the bank offers a full line of individual and business banking services and has 16 banking centers located in Cambridge, Acton, Arlington, Bedford, Belmont, Burlington, Concord, Lexington, Newton Centre, Newtonville and Watertown.  For more information about Cambridge Savings Bank, go to: www.cambridgesavings.com.

About Central Square Theater

Central Square Theater (CST) is a state-of-the-art theatrical arts facility where audiences find, under one roof, the distinctive repertoires of two award-winning, professional companies, Underground Railway Theater (URT) and The Nora Theatre Company (The Nora), as well as collaborative projects drawing on their creative synergy.  A cultural anchor in the community, schools, families and community groups benefit from outreach and educational programs, and the local economy is boosted by the over 26,000 audience members that visit CST each year and enjoy the multicultural, multi-generational, urban environment of Central Square, Cambridge. As the first permanent home for both theater companies, Central Square Theater is a vibrant hub of theatrical, educational and social activity, where artists and audiences come together to create theater vital to the community. The theater is dedicated to providing affordable ticket prices for underserved communities and offers free or discounted tickets to many local non-profit organizations.

About Youth Underground

Youth Underground serves youth ages 13-18 with stipend eligible opportunities to create theater together and in tandem with community-based organizations that connects with and speaks to issues of community and youth; and to showcase their work throughout the city, Greater Boston, and at Central Square Theater. Youth Underground holds both an academic year program and intensive summer residency with an annual Ensemble of 30 members. Youth Underground showcases work through performances, a youth driven Community Dialogue Series, and peer exchanges with local and global organizations. Past and current community partnerships include peer exchanges with the Al-Rowwad Theater and Cultural Center, True Colors: OUT Youth Theater; CCTV Teen Media Summer Institute, and Community Art Center’s ‘DIYDS National Film Festival’.