And the verdict is … keep it!

What started as a math enrichment project for five Pakanasink students turned into a school-wide campaign with students and staff weighing in on whether the smallest denomination of coin – the penny – should continue to exist.

Michelle Pollack, STEAM coordinator and math coach, was working with the five students – Alex, Ethan, Luke, Sophia and Nessa – on this project-based learning project strictly from the viewpoint of math. Ms. Pollack spoke to Lisa Quick, a literacy coach in the district, and they decided to make it a joint project.

Now, in addition to the math part of this project, the students would make presentations based on their points of view. They would choose a position – keep the penny or get rid of it – and try to persuade their classmates, teachers and administrators to agree with them.

After choosing their positions – three were in favor of eliminating the penny and two were against it – the first step was taking a poll of all 2nd through 5th grade students, teachers and administrators on how they felt about the issue. Then the students created trifold boards stating their positions and placed them in the cafeteria. They also hung signs throughout the school and videotaped their speeches. The videos were shared with the teachers who showed them to their classes.

The initial poll showed that 77.2 percent of the students and staff surveyed want the penny to stay. Only 22.8 percent voted to abolish it.

Why should we get rid of the penny that bears the face of one of our most revered presidents, Abraham Lincoln? Well, according to Alex and Ethan:

• Most people don’t carry change around with them, especially pennies;
• It takes 1.5 cents to make every penny;
• Charities will benefit because instead of donating pennies, people will donate nickels, dimes and quarters;
• Paychecks would be rounded up to 5 cents increments.

  

They also said the penny should be phased out rather than stopping all at once. “A good plan would be to gradually phase out pennies until they’re rare and valuable, like the $2 bill.”

The opposite view was taken by Luke, Sophia and Nessa. They said pennies add up, noting that doubling a penny every day for a month gives you more than $10 million! They also said:

• It would be disrespectful to Abraham Lincoln;
• Charities would suffer since many people are happy to donate their pennies, which add up to hundreds of millions of dollars each year;
• All cash transactions would be rounded up to a nickel, costing people more;
• Pennies stay in circulation for up to 30 years.

After their hard work, another poll was taken. The result: Keep the penny won overwhelmingly.

The final vote:

Keep the penny – 73.7 percent

Abolish the penny – 26.3 percent

So there you have it. The project that started out as a simple math enrichment exercise turned into much more, with students honing their research, math, writing and public speaking skills, while getting the majority of the school involved in the outcome.

Read the speeches given by the students in favor of keeping the penny and opposed to the penny here.

 

Keep the penny!

Have you ever thought about those little copper coins just laying around? They’re pennies. One penny may seem to you a very insignificant thing, but it is the small seed from which fortunes spring. Well, you might not know this, but pennies play an important role in our economy, there are many reasons why we should keep the penny in our economic system.

Let me ask you a question, “Would you rather have a million dollars or a penny doubled every day for a month?” You’re probably thinking a million dollars but think about it, a penny doubled every day for a month is actually $10,737,418.24! That’s way more than 1 million. Pennies cost 2¢ more than how much their worth, while nickels cost 5¢ more than the nickel is worth.

Some supporters of the penny point out that the penny is the only coin bearing the image of Abraham Lincoln, clearly our nation’s most revered president. Eliminating the penny would be disrespectful to his memory. Some may argue he is also on the $5 bill but I think he has gained way more respect than being on just the $5 bill.

Even if pennies seem worthless, they actually add up to hundreds of millions of dollars in charitable donations each year. The very fact pennies have so little value makes them useful to charities, because people are happy to give them away. If all pennies are eliminated, all cash transactions will have to be rounded off to the nearest nickel. Low income Americans would be hit especially hard because they are more likely to pay for their purchases with cash. Poor people will be affected also, because the poor are more likely to make more frequent smaller, purchases, thus suffering the rounding up more often.

Although the penny takes 1.5¢ to mint (or make) in 2018, a single penny remains in circulation for about 30 years after it is minted and most are used in thousands of transactions over that period of time. That means that a penny can be worth over a dollar! The United States Mint makes over 20,000,000 pennies per day, or 7,000,000,000 pennies per year. That adds up to $2,100,000,000 every generation of only pennies. Remember, pennies cost 2¢ more than how much their worth, while nickels cost 5¢ more than the nickel is worth.

If 77.1% of you voted to keep the penny in our 1st poll I bet we can get you to vote to keep the penny again to 100%! You guys can do it, help us reach goal! Be a Keeper not a sweeper! And remember a penny saved is a penny earned.

 

Get rid of the penny!

Hello everybody..  I want you to do something for me.  Reach into your pockets and pull out all your pennies.  You don’t have any?  Well, pretty much nobody carries change.  And when somebody does, he/she usually doesn’t carry any pennies.  So why do we make so many?

Only 22.5% of you voted against the penny in our first poll. To sway the 77.5% of you over, I’ll make a point here, how does a bunch of precious metals only cost 1 cent each? Well, pennies actually cost 1.5 cents to mint. I’m Ethan Vasquez and this is true. Plus, the penny is only worth 1 cent. So what’s the point? With pennies, there is sales tax, where prices are raised to an uneven amount making you have to give pennies in payment. But if we get rid of it, the tax will be raised to every 5 cents. Because of this, paychecks will have to be rounded up, which means MORE MONEY!  I know greedy CEOs might round DOWN instead of UP for paychecks, however, we can protest this issue and eventually win the extra money for the workers.

I know some people argue that minting factories may shut down, but this argument is weak, since minting factories will be occupied with other coins and print money.  And some say that copper mining jobs will go down, but copper wire, copper pipes, copper fillings, copper valves etc. have plenty of uses.  In fact, the average house uses 439 pounds of copper according to Google.  And other mining jobs will rise.

Other people will argue that people will stop donating to charity. But, this will be for the good, since people will donate with nickels, dimes, quarters, and possibly dollar bills! As a result, charities will make more money to support the people!

If you wonder what will happen to the penny if we stop minting them, a good plan would be to gradually phase out pennies “until they’re rare and valuable, like the $2 bill,” as one of our experts, Mrs. Austin said.  And for the extra copper and zinc, we could melt that and use it in other ways.

 There you have it folks, I’m Alexander Kearns-Shook and I’m Ethan Vasquez, and this is why YOU should vote to get rid of the penny.

GET RID OF IT, GET RID OF IT, GET RID OF IT!