Holly Pond High School offer 'Adulting 101' to senior class
May 4—HOLLY POND — Ask any millennial and they will be the first to tell you, adulting is indeed hard. Normal, arbitrary tasks such as filing your taxes, submitting a job application or even checking the oil in your car may seem simple enough, but Holly Pond High School Principal Nate Ayers is aware that any task can be difficult if it hasn't been properly taught. This is why he made Thursday's "Adulting 101 Day" one of his top priorities during his first year.
"There was a school system close to me, about four or five years ago, that held one of these events and I thought our kids deserve that same type of opportunity. On Day 1, when we got here on campus and started putting our plan together for the year, this day was one that was non-negotiable for me," Ayers said.
Just before Christmas break, the school distributed surveys throughout the Holly Pond community asking for feedback on what some of the most critical life skills students needed to know as they transitioned into adulthood. As those surveys were returned, the school began recruiting community leaders to offer brief presentations on many of the most popular responses.
In lieu of their regularly scheduled classes on Thursday, May 2, the HPHS senior class rotated between 14 modules where they were given a crash course on many of life's most daunting, but necessary, tasks such as establishing a monthly budget, building personal credit and the pros and cons of renting vs. leasing vs. owning a home.
Director of Marketing and Public Relations at Premier Bank of the South and former East Elementary School Principal, David Wiggins discussed the "lost art" of crafting a cover letter for your resume.
"You need to be that person that stands apart from the stack of papers on the desk. When I was at East Elementary, I would get no less than 60 resumes for one job opening. What stood out to me were the people who walked in and said, 'I just wanted to introduce myself and say that I'm interested in the posted position.' The second thing that stood out was their attire and their demeanor when they walked in," Wiggins said.
Luckily for the students, HPHS alumnus Jason Simpson — the chief meteorologist for WVTM 13 in Birmingham — was also on hand to offer his advice on professional attire and to demonstrate how to properly tie a tie. One of the most crucial bits of advice he had was, "Always make sure you have at least one really good shirt and one really good tie."
Other lessons ranged from navigating the stock market, to caring for newborns. Cullman County School Board members Kerry Neighbors and Heath Albright discussed managing debts responsibly and entrepreneurship, while Cullman County Commissioner Kelly Duke gave a brief over view of civic responsibility, offering resources on how to register to vote and to understand different types of taxes.
Ayers said while the community may have played the largest role in deciding the day's curriculum, all of the lessons were ones that would have benefitted him greatly when he was younger.
"You know, any time you are sitting around at a barbecue or any kind of gathering where teenagers are around, you get to thinking. 'Man, if I would have known this when I was 18 ... it could have completely changed everything.' Everybody needs to know about debt, how to build credit, why taxes are taken out of your check and even how to tie a tie and look a person in the eye when you shake their hand," Ayers said.
Ayers said he is planning on the program becoming an annual event for Holly Pond seniors and said if the students even took one small bit of information away from each lesson, he would consider this pilot event a success. Perhaps one of the most important take-aways, he said, was one from Albright's lecture.
"If they only get one thing out of an investment session and that changes their lives, that's a win," Ayers said. "Heath made a really good point in his session. He said, 'You have to choose your hard.' Being financially free is hard but being poor is also hard. Doing things that you love is hard, but not getting to do anything that you enjoy is hard. You have to choose your hard."
