National band stops by Ballard to teach financial literacy

Oct. 04--HUXLEY -- Gooding doesn't seem like someone you'd take financial advice from.

His hair is long and unkempt, and he wears a denim jacket and work boots along with the guitar slung over his shoulders.

But all he wants to do is to tell kids how to avoid a predatory loan scheme.

Gooding and his band stopped at Ballard High School Tuesday afternoon to play music and talk about loans, savings accounts and investing.

Gooding (he goes only by his last name and uses it for the band) said he began working with students after he found himself struggling to make it as a touring musician looking for a record deal.

He said the archetype of someone rising to fame and fortune or winning the lottery making all their financial problems go away is a false narrative. Instead, he wants to teach students how to save and build a stable financial base early on and through adulthood.

He eventually shifted towards running his own record label and production company, making music for commercials and licensing his work for movies and television.

"I made a lot of mistakes with money and I thought a record deal would solve all my problems, so we want kids to have a basic understanding of finances and especially staying away from predatory stuff," he said.

Gooding's music is all original rock songs, with titles like "Because It Hurts" and "Down In Old Mexico" off their upcoming album. There isn't a sliver of financial literacy information in their songs, which Gooding said is on purpose.

"I wouldn't want to listen to that band, and you wouldn't want to either," he said with a laugh.

Although they were there to teach students about financial literacy, the band behaved like any normal rock band would. They played loud and hard, as if they were in a punk club instead of a high school auditorium.

During one song, Gooding pointed to and winked at a girl in the front row. She blushed and covered her face in glee.

Afterward, Gooding came out to make a presentation to the students and took some of their questions about finances. He said finance is hard to teach by itself because teachers have to remain calm every day about a tough subject to learn.

The band, he said, adds a kick of excitement to the subject.

"Music makes the medicine go down," he said. "We get to play some rock and roll, we get to do something loud and rambunctious, and then say, 'OK guys, we're going to talk about financial literacy' and I don't even think it sounds sexy, but here's why it's important and here's why it's rock and roll."

The Ballard stop was co-sponsored by the Iowa Insurance Division and is part of Gooding's "Funding the Future" tour, a charity trying to establish financial literacy as a required class in every high school in the country.

Gooding said every student needs to have a basic understanding of personal finance, because without it, they can fall prey to bad decisions that stunt their future.

"I knew more about geometry than I know about how to balance a checkbook when I left high school and I didn't know about a credit score until I screwed mine up," he said. "My feeling is, if people get this stuff young, they still have the time where their money can make some money for them."

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