Should we help those in our communities get their financial houses in order? Is it worth our efforts to create networks that can help our peers have a brighter future? For me, the answer was a resounding YES!
I'm a fervent reader of all things Andrew Hallam, including his excellent blog. When he announced he was going to have free dates to speak here in Dubai, and that one of those dates was a Tuesday when our school does Professional Development, I felt like the stars had aligned! I contacted him and my school's director to try to set up a visit, so that my colleagues could benefit like I had a year before when I saw Andrew for the first time.
Fortunately, my director had a copy of Millionaire Teacher on his bookshelf, and his amazing wife is also a big supporter of Andrew's philosophies. With their help, we were able to arrange for Andrew to come and speak at our school, and a huge chunk of the faculty and staff came to listen.
You could tell from the reactions at Andrew's talk that a lot of lightbulbs were going on all over the place. Andrew has that effect on people. But what I noticed afterwards were a lot of people had questions about actually implementing the ideas that Andrew spoke about, and needed more continuing support in order to be successful.
I love helping people, and I love teaching people (it's probably why I'm the Happiest Teacher!), and I wanted to be able to create something that would help my co-workers (who are awesome, by the way) execute these ideas. So I ran this idea by the director's wife, and she gave me some excellent advice and help, and after a helpful google form asking if people were interested and what topics they wanted to focus on went out, I got quite a few positive responses. There was DEFINITELY interest, and as one person put it, "Who doesn't want to be a millionaire?"
So the Millionaire Teacher Club (local chapter), was born! Today is our first meeting, and I've put together a couple short presentations, one on saving and spending, and one on putting together a portfolio that I hope will address many people's initial concerns.
I also put together a sheet so that people can list what topics they're happy to try to answer questions about, so that I can pool our knowledge and if members have specific questions, they will be able to easily find a peer who can help guide them. I certainly don't have all the answers, and I think this will help create a feel of a community instead of me just lecturing at people.
So, in terms of time commitment so far, it's taken me about 2 hours of work. We plan on meeting once a month, and have a google classroom page set up so that people can ask questions and get help in between meetings. For me, I think that is a great return on investment (ROI)!
Now, I'm not an expert, and I have no idea how this will turn out, but I'm hoping that with all our heads and experience combined, we will be able to help people attain the financial future and freedom they desire.
What do you think? Would you do this at your school or office? If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me. And as always, please subscribe to the blog and comment below!
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