Credit union opens inside high school

Hartford, Conn. (WTNH) - It's not any old bank opening that gets a marching band, but this is not any old bank. It's a branch of Franklin Trust Federal Credit Union that is inside Hartford Public High School for students to use as their own bank.

"It gives kids a way to take care of their own financial problems and to be in the real world and see how it is to be in the real world," senior Kemeisha Haye said.

"We know a lot of college students are in default of loans or credit card s," Asst. Superintendent Dr. Christina Kishimoto said. "This is a great way to teach them those skills now in High School in preparation for college."

It's just the latest of several Franklin Trust branches to open inside Hartford schools. There is also a branch inside Bulkeley High School. The credit union admits it will bring in new customers, but it's also a way of investing in the future.

"We are here to help educate Hartford Public Students so that they will be better able to handle their own financial lives," Michael Shea from Franklin Trust said.

Not only are students going to be coming in here, doing their banking and learning how to be customers, they're going to be working behind the counter as well, as tellers, learning the banking trade.

"How to treat others and if I have a customer, the way to talk to them," Haye said. "There's many things you can learn from having a job in a bank."

That means this will be as much classroom as financial institution, and it should reap long-term dividends for its student customers.