YOUR CASH COUNTS Financial Literacy
For Your Future
SDSU Benchmarking and Investment Activities
South Dakota State University
Department of Economics
BADM 280: Personal Finance
Benchmarking and Investment Activity
Instructor: Bruce Johnson, MBA* *Used with persmission
Instructor Notes and Directions:
The project is in two sections on an MS Excel sheet. There are three sheets (tabs). The first tab is a list of websites used by students to fill in the rest of the other two sheets. The benchmarking assignment is similar to budgeting, but I found early on students did not have a good idea of how to allocate their paycheck. The excel sheet breaks down their pay to the average household expenditure based on data from the bureau of labor and statistics. They then play around with the numbers to see where they can save. After they have the numbers for housing and vehicles, they go online and determine what that amount buys them.
The second project is an investment exercise that is to replicate the investment process. The purpose is for them to learn how risk impacts investment strategy and asset allocation. They then go through a process of valuating stocks. I tie this to what they can expect to see when they sign up for a 401k/403b plan and the options they will have when selecting funds.
