Junior Achievement Program

Junior Achievement’s proven lessons in financial literacy, work and career readiness, and entrepreneurship are shown to positively impact the lives of young people. These lessons align with national and state educational standards and are delivered to millions of students across the country with the help of our education partners and volunteers from the local community.

Research shows that JA Alumni are more likely to have a college degree, feel confident managing money, have career success, and have started a business as an adult. The program connects community volunteers with teachers who would like the Junior Achievement program taught in their classrooms.

JEDC needs both teachers that want to have the program in their classrooms, as well as volunteers to teach the programs. Interested teachers and volunteers contact Robyn at rmesdag@jedc.org. Visit the link below for more information on the Junior Acheivement Program.

Welcome Craig Fox: AmeriCorps Member

Craig is new to Juneau. He is originally from Philadelphia where he just graduated from Temple University with a degree in Data Science. Craig has previously worked as a museum manager next to Independence Hall. JEDC is happy to have him as our new Americorps member where he is excited to help expand STEM education in Juneau. In his free time Craig hikes, watches movies with his roommates, and reads.

Did you miss JEDC's feature on Action Line this month? Listen at the link below. 

Hear from Brian (Executive Director) and Martina (Entrepreneurship Lead) as they visit topics such as:

• JEDC Launch PAD
• Revolving Loan Fund
• The Angel Conference
• Junior Achievement
• And More!

Interested students should check with their schools about joining or starting a FIRST LEGO League or FIRST Tech Challenge team. Adult volunteers are always needed to help out, so contact your school or Alyson Cooper for more information.

JEDC Platinum Investor

Southeast Eldercare Coalition

JEDC Gold Investor

All dollar values were adjusted for inflation and are in 2021 dollars. Wages are money paid to employees by an employer and do not include other sources of income such as self-employment, returns on investments, and retirement.

Money from individual assistance sent directly to Juneauites was larger than the drop in wages in 2020 and 2021. Individual assistance totaled $60 million in 2020 and 2021. When combined, wages and individual assistance in 2020 sum to $1,042 million which is $40 million greater than wages in 2019 ($1,022 million in wages). Wages and individual assistance in 2021 sum to $1,046 million. Both years are close to the wage totals from 2013 to 2015. It is important to remember that different parts of Juneau’s population were affected in different ways and by no means does this data show everyone in Juneau did fine or well in the last two years.

Individual assistance programs that were considered include the three Economic Impact Payments, CBJ Rental Relief, CBJ Individual Assistance Grant, CBJ ArtWorks, and AHFC Rental Relief. The AHFC Homeowners Relief program was not considered since distributions took place in 2022. The CBJ Covid Conservation Corps and PPP programs (if used for payroll) was also included in the QCEW wage data.

Comparing business grants and gross sales to businesses comes with a little more nuance than individuals due to the types of data available. If you were to translate an individual’s wages to business finances, it would be most accurate to call them profits. Data on profits is hard to come by so we look at Gross Business Sales (gross revenue). Grants are generally akin to profit and represent more revenue than their dollar value (think about the difference between selling $100 worth of goods vs being given $100).

The same is not true looking at gross business sales in Juneau. Despite adding $110 million in 2020 and $49 million in 2021 in business grants (and more in loans), the total of gross sales and aid show a drop of $236 million in gross sales between 2019 to 2020 and a drop of $41 million from 2019 to 2021. Gross Business Sales were highest in 2016 and 2017 at $2,866 million and $2,832 million, respectively.

JEDC Silver Investor