[ti:Junior Achievement Marks 90 Years of Business Education]
[ar:Steve Ember]
[al:Economics Report]
[by:WWW.51VOA.COM]
[00:00.00]This is the VOA Special English 
[00:03.46]Economics Report.
[00:05.05]This year, 
[00:06.01]Junior Achievement 
[00:07.55]marks its ninetieth anniversary 
[00:09.69]of educating young people 
[00:11.84]about business and economics. 
[00:14.78]The nonprofit organization 
[00:17.07]is the largest of its kind. 
[00:19.56]Jack Kosakowky 
[00:21.31]is executive vice president.
[00:24.24]"We are the oldest business 
[00:26.88]and economic education 
[00:28.17]organization in the world. 
[00:30.09]We're now serving 
[00:31.53]nine-point-two million 
[00:33.12]young people around the globe 
[00:35.28]in one hundred twenty-three 
[00:36.68]different countries."
[00:37.73]Programs begin in elementary school 
[00:40.81]and continue through middle 
[00:42.90]and high school. 
[00:44.40]The education is based 
[00:46.29]on the ideas of market-based 
[00:48.84]economics and entrepreneurship.
[00:51.92]Junior Achievement began 
[00:54.16]in nineteen nineteen 
[00:56.07]in Springfield, Massachusetts.
[00:58.76] Two business leaders, 
[01:00.71]Horace Moses and Theodore Vail, 
[01:03.71]joined with Senator Murray Crane 
[01:08.51]of Massachusetts to start the group.
[01:10.11]For more than fifty years, 
[01:12.59]Junior Achievement programs 
[01:14.63]operated through clubs 
[01:16.62]that met after school. 
[01:19.06]But in nineteen seventy-five, 
[01:21.45]JA also began to teach business skills 
[01:25.60]during the school day.
[01:28.10]Volunteers from the community teach 
[01:31.37]about businesses, 
[01:32.95]how they are organized, 
[01:34.99]and how products are made and sold.
[01:38.82] The volunteers also teach 
[01:41.51]about the American and world economies 
[01:44.85]and about industry and trade.
[01:48.44]The Junior Achievement Company Program 
[01:51.58]teaches young people 
[01:53.24]how entrepreneurship works. 
[01:56.43]They learn about business 
[01:58.32]by operating their own companies.
[02:01.70]Students develop a product 
[02:04.04]and sell shares in their company. 
[02:07.44]They use the money 
[02:08.89]to buy the materials they need 
[02:11.18]to make their product,
[02:12.87]which they then sell. 
[02:14.86]Finally, they return the profits 
[02:17.81]to the people who bought shares 
[02:19.86]in the company.
[02:21.35]Chellsey Cruz joined 
[02:23.64]a student-operated company 
[02:26.00]two years ago. 
[02:27.51]The Higher Grounds Cafe 
[02:29.81]in West Hills, California, 
[02:32.01]sells high quality coffee.
[02:34.74]She says her experience 
[02:37.07]has given her valuable training 
[02:39.82]that will help her for a lifetime.
[02:42.62]CHELLSEY CRUZ: "It taught me 
[02:43.91]to be dedicated, 
[02:45.16]and that if you want 
[02:46.15]to be successful, 
[02:47.06]you have to put in 
[02:47.91]a lot of time and effort. 
[02:49.21]You really have to work at it."
[02:50.77]Junior Achievement says 
[02:52.57]three hundred eighty-five thousand 
[02:55.06]volunteers support its programs 
[02:57.65]around the world. 
[02:59.65]In the United States alone, 
[03:02.19]there are nearly 
[03:03.48]twenty-three thousand places 
[03:05.83]that hold Junior Achievement events.
[03:09.02]Junior Achievement Incorporated 
[03:12.35]and Junior Achievement International 
[03:15.78]combined their operations
[03:18.09]in two thousand four. 
[03:20.58]They formed Junior Achievement Worldwide.
[03:24.26]Its headquarters are 
[03:26.55]in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
[03:29.65]And that's the VOA Special English 
[03:32.83]Economics Report,
[03:34.48] written by Mario Ritter 
[03:36.17]with additional reporting 
[03:37.81]by Faiza Elmasry. 
[03:40.15]Transcripts, MP3s and podcasts 
[03:43.95]of our programs can be found 
[03:45.95]at 51voa.com. 
[03:49.59]And you can follow us 
[03:51.68]on Twitter at VOA Special English.
[03:55.52]I'm Steve Ember.