Elena Zee: When I was growing up in China, I was in the midst of cultural revolution. They want to get rid of the wealth, property, knowledge. If you have knowledge, that's not good. One day I told my mother, "I'm going to be a business woman on Wall Street." It was pouring rain and I thought, "Where am I? What is this place?" It just seems there's abundance of everything. All cars, very high tech. When you don't have any choice, life is very simple. Where there’s more choices, there is more responsibility.
Elena Zee: And one day I had an opportunity to purchase a one bedroom apartment. The realtor showed me a schedule of mortgage payment, and I just got so overwhelmed by these terminologies, amortization, down payment. It was the first time I heard about mortgage. And I didn't do anything, and here I was, I'm working in the financial services industry. I thought if I were so confused by it, I'm sure most people were. I started seeing the serious lack of financial literacy in the community. We need to change that. It is as important as reading, writing, and math. Someone told me about Arizona Council On Economic Education, whose mission is to make sure our children become financially, economically literate. And I remember thinking, we need to put that education into schools. I got certification, licenses, and I joined the board.
Elena Zee: How are you everybody? Good morning. I want to empower the teachers who are the real heroes.
Speaker 2: All right, so ladies and gentlemen, today we are going to continue our discussion on compound interest. We read about compound interest. Does anybody remember anything about compound interest that they can share with me? Anything?
Elena Zee: I come from a family of teachers, my parents, my grandmother. Growing up, I want to be like them. Looking back, I grew up in China during a time when education, choices, investment, was not allowed. Now I live in a country where we have abundance of opportunities, choices. I feel that we have a responsibility to give back and to help other people to reach their full potential.
