Though our kids were home during last Friday’s one-day teacher’s strike, they still spent the day learning.

At the boys campus, our young men spent the morning studying, playing chess, doing arts and crafts, and working through the financial literacy program Everfi.

Steve Ritzema, the Director of Career Resources, said that all of the kids participate in Everfi during their stay at Mercy Home. Because so many of them come from poor financial backgrounds, this program helps give kids a place to start.

“It gives them a baseline of financial knowledge,” Ritzema explained.

The program gives a crash course in areas like saving, banking, credit scores, and higher education.

One of the young men, Sylvester, spent the morning working on the higher education portion. Having already been accepted to five colleges and waiting to hear from the a sixth, he learned more about receiving scholarships—something Mercy Home encourages all the kids to do.

“It’s talking about how to earn scholarships,” he said. “They kind of push you hard to get as much money as possible.”

The boys were also able to exercise their artistic sides by working on making their own puzzles. They took precut pieces, colored and decorated them, then traded with the others to put them together. According to participant Rashaun, this added to the challenge.

“It’s not like a real puzzle,” he said. “It’s one that someone else drew, so you have to think about it.”

To round out the morning of exercising their minds, a group of boys played chess together. A couple of the boys even taught a Mercy Home coworker how to play.

One of the boys-turned-teacher, Jordan, said that he enjoyed playing chess.

“It’s fun, the strategy,” he said.

Thank you to Everfi for providing the boys of Mercy Home the financial literacy opportunity.