[Verbatim] Zachary Yoder from Murrah High School in Jackson was named the 2009 Economics Student of the Year, an honor given to the student with the highest individual scores on the Mississippi Council on Economics' statewide Economic and Financial Literacy Challenge. Students compete on the topics of microeconomics, macroeconomics, international economics and current events.
Yoder received a $500 scholarship provided by BankPlus, Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi and State Farm Insurance Companies. Murrah High School was one of nine Mississippi high schools to have teams to advance to the finals in the competition's Adam Smith Division for Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate and honors students.
Sponsored by the Mississippi Council on Economic Education and now in its sixth year of competition, this year's Challenge, for the first time, included an online first round. Competing in the first round were 101 teams, a total of 374 students, from high schools across Mississippi.
"Early results from the online first round showed that Mississippi students scored five and a half times higher than the national average of students taking the test in other states," said Dr. Pamela Smith, president of the Mississippi Council on Economic Education. "This year's high participation rate and impressive student scores are a direct result of the economics and financial literacy training that more than 4,000 of our Mississippi K-12 teachers have received over the last three years.
"The students are able to succeed at this level because of the value their teachers and schools have placed on mastery of high level economics and financial literacy skills," Smith added.
The Mississippi Council on Economic Education provides teacher training and the Virtual Economics(r) CD-ROM curriculum at no charge to teachers, through funding from State Farm(r) Insurance Companies and the Council for Economic Education. More than 200 Mississippi teachers have committed to additional professional development and earned the Master Teacher of Economics endorsement established by the Mississippi Department of Education.
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