Shira, a student at John Philip Sousa Elementary School in Port Washington, New York, reflected on her most and least favorite Stock Market Game investments, exploring the pressure of market swings and the importance of research, discipline and planning to prevail. By connecting her experience investing in a volatile market to an improved long-term, diversified strategy for the future, Shira wowed the thousands of financial professionals judging InvestWrite’s analyst-style essays.
Shira’s essay stood out for its clear reasoning and practical application of investing principles. Rather than focusing only on performance, the essay demonstrated an understanding of asset allocation, long-term planning, and how to refine a strategy based on experience. Shira and her teacher Jeanne Zeh were honored by the SIFMA Foundation at a ceremony on June 18.
InvestWrite is the culminating written challenge of the SIFMA Foundation’s Stock Market Game, a curriculum-based simulation in which students learn saving and investing fundamentals and manage a hypothetical $100,000 portfolio of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, and cash on a real-world online trading platform. Since 1977, the program has reached nearly 24 million youth and is widely recognized for strengthening academic achievement in math, economics, and personal finance.
“This year’s essay prompt asked students to reflect deeply on their own decision-making,” said Melanie Mortimer, President of the SIFMA Foundation. “When young people evaluate their investment choices and outcomes, they begin to see that financial growth comes from analysis, diversification, and long-term thinking. That kind of reflection is at the heart of lifelong financial capability, building the skills and confidence to make informed, risk-managed decisions that drive future success.”
Each year, InvestWrite challenges students in grades 4–12 to apply what they have learned in The Stock Market Game™ to a real-world financial scenario. Essays are reviewed by thousands of financial professionals from hundreds of financial firms and banks serving as volunteer judges who look for depth of knowledge, critical thinking, and a practical vision for financial independence.
SIFMA Foundation provides a portfolio of financial education programs that are effective in a variety of settings, from schools and afterschools to libraries, community centers and homes nationwide. Families can discover the excitement of learning together about investing through SMG InvestQuest™ and the Summer Stock Market Game, both of which are offered free of charge.
SMG InvestQuest is a 30-minute online simulation that spans five years of real market activity and challenges users to allocate a hypothetical portfolio in response to news and industry trends. The program teaches the basics of investing and emphasizes asset allocation, portfolio diversification, and long-term investing. It is available anytime for individuals, families, and educators at www.stockmarketgame.org and promises a fun way for families to connect.
The Summer Stock Market Game is a free national competition that runs from June to August and allows family members to participate as individuals or teams. Youth participants are eligible to compete for prizes, receive certificates of completion, and continue building essential financial skills outside the classroom. Registration is available at https://smg.stockmarketgame.org/#.
“Our summer and digital programs extend investor education beyond a single classroom experience,” Mortimer added. “When students reflect on their investment decisions and connect them to long-term financial goals, they build confidence that carries into adulthood.”
In this year’s Spring essay competition, students were asked to respond to the following prompt:
“Describe your Stock Market Game portfolio. Discuss how you could diversify your portfolio for success in 10 years. Explain what stocks, bonds, and/or mutual funds you would add or remove and why.”
Students were challenged to demonstrate not only what they invested in, but what they learned—and how those lessons would shape future financial decisions.
Winning Essay
Following My Dream
Do you like Halloween? I sure do. But on Halloween I don’t want just one type of candy. I want many different types of candy. The best way to get a variety of candy is to go to many different houses on different streets. Just like with stocks, you don’t want to invest in one company or sector. You want to diversify.
You want to diversify because sometimes a certain sector stops making as much money, for example technology. If you only had money in Microsoft (MSFT), Apple (AAPL), and other tech companies something could happen and people would not want to buy their products anymore. But if you had your money spread out amongst many sectors like me and my Stock Market Game partner did then if one sector goes down it hardly makes a dent in your portfolio.
When my Stock Market Game partner and I were trying to diversify our portfolio, we looked at lots of different sectors, some include finance, technology, consumer defensive, and consumer cyclical.
My Stock Market Game partner and I invested in six companies, Pepsi (PEP), AAPL, Costco (COST), CVS (CVS), Electronic Arts (EA), and The Gap (GAP). Nearly all of these companies are in different sectors. That helps us diversify. Another way to diversify is by looking at beta. Beta measures the volatility of a stock. A beta less than one means that the stock is less volatile or less risky. If a company has a beta greater than one the stock is more volatile or riskier. If the beta is equal to one that means the price correlates with the market.
Doing the research on the companies to make sure they would help us gain money was challenging but it was very helpful. It was helpful not only because we gained money but because it made me think harder about certain decisions which I am sure will help me all through life.
Over the course of 10 years, I have some changes I would like to make to my portfolio to increase the amount of money I make. The first thing I would do is to invest in an S&P 500 mutual fund like VFIAX from Vanguard. This would be good for my portfolio because I wouldn’t just be investing in one company, I would be investing in 500 companies. I would also buy more stocks from EA because I think that they will continue growing. Right now, my Stock Market Game portfolio has 20 shares of EA Sports. EA sports is a video game company with some of the games they produce are The Sims, Apex Legends, and Battlefield. These games have been very popular amongst streamers and kids who just want a game to play.
During the Stock Market Game, I learned about how your money can grow even if you don’t touch it. If you put your money in a mutual funds account, your money gets invested without you actually doing anything to it. You just must make safe investments and know when you need to take some risks.
In the future I would like to go to medical school and become a child psychiatrist so I can help kids who are struggling with neurodiversity. A successful investment plan would help me to grow my money while still being able to focus on school. If I can have a stable investment plan in college and medical school, then I will be in a good place financially when I get out of school.
I’m so grateful I had the opportunity to participate in the Stock Market Game. The Stock Market Game has taught me to manage my money and investments. Just like on Halloween I want to visit lots of houses, as I grow up it will become bigger than getting candy. It will be learning new things and using money wisely. Now it’s candy, in 10 years it will be stocks, but whoever I become and whatever I do, the Stock Market Game has made me more prepared for the future than ever before.
Dr. Passi, Shira, Jeanne Zeh, Dr. Sheehan, and Dr. Shields
Shira, 1st in NY State and 1st in the Nation is the 2025-2026 Spring InvestWrite® Competition
Ms. Cangelosi, Shira, Ms. Silver, and Ms. Zeh
