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Three Oakton High School students turned a school project into an international effort to teach young children about money management through storytelling.

Dev Rai, Austin Chen, and Ayush Ranjan created “The Seed That Grows,” a children’s book designed to introduce elementary students to concepts like saving, investing, and delayed gratification. The Fairfax County teens wrote the story and created all the illustrations themselves as part of a DECA financial literacy initiative.

The book uses a simple metaphor to make complex ideas accessible to young readers. Two children each receive a seed: one plants it and waits for a tree to grow, while the other trades the seed for candy. As the story unfolds, readers see the contrast between short-term thinking and long-term planning.

“For being able to be financially stable, you have to have those basic skills about not just spending money whenever you get a chance, but actually having that basic discipline in order to save it or wait awhile,” Rai said.

From Local Schools to Four Continents

The team raised more than $1,000 to fund the project and distributed 274 books to 12 Fairfax County elementary schools. Through their adviser’s connections at the World Bank, translated versions reached schools in India, China, Kazakhstan, and Australia.

The students also conducted read-aloud sessions at schools and surveyed participants before and after. They found a 74% improvement in students’ understanding of the financial concepts presented.

Research showing that habits like patience and gratitude often develop during elementary school years motivated the team to target younger children rather than their high school peers.

What’s Next

The trio plans to adapt the book’s concepts into a financial literacy game, aiming to reinforce “habit-based learning in order to instill their success and their discipline and their financial success when they grow up and manage their finances,” Rai said.