Danny Dollar Academy – Ty Allan Jackson

About the Danny Dollar Academy

Welcome to Danny Dollar Academy where elementary school students are preparing for life as millionaires. Third, fourth and fifth grade classes around the country are participating in the newly-minted Danny Dollar Academy (DDA), a school-age financial literacy program developed by Dr. Abdullah Al-Bahrani, Profesor of Economics at Northern Kentucky University’s Center for Economic Education and Ty Allan Jackson author of Danny Dollar Millionaire Extraordinaire: The Lemonade Escapade.

Within the week long program students are given a pre-assessment about their knowledge of finance and entrepreneurship. Then lead by their teachers these students read Danny Dollar, go through the week long financial curriculum created by Dr. Al-Bahrani then transform the concepts they’ve learned into creative projects, including business plans, career projects, financial powerpoint presentations, visual art, dance and music composition all about money. Jackson then visits the school, giving a brief presentation about financial success and tours the student projects and performances. Finally the students take a post assessment to see him much they retained and submit both assessments to Dr. Al-Bahrani to analyze the data.

“Teachers are the single most important influence on student success, that’s been proven,” says Jackson, who is also the founder of Big Head Books, LLC and the Read or Else campaign. “Financial educators and parents have a direct impact both on short-term student outcomes and on long-term financial well-being. The Danny Dollar Academy provides the kind of exposure to financial literacy that is needed to get kids thinking about their most valuable investment…their future. And to explore that future in creative ways.”

A former corporate salesman, Ty Allan Jackson–children’s book author and founder of Big Head Books, LLC.–wrote Danny Dollar Millionaire Extraordinaire in order to increase reading and financial literacy for students. The book teaches children how to save, invest, and become entrepreneurs, all within the context of a lemonade stand venture gone right!

Jackson partnered with Dr. Abdullah Al-Bahrani, Northern Kentucky University (NKU) and US Bank College of Business’s assistant professor of economics and director of the NKU Center for Economic Education, as well as teachers and administrators at Wheatley Elementary to pilot a financial literacy program called the Danny Dollar Academy. Their goal is to expand programming from coast to coast.