Finance management skills being taught to your students

With many adults and households now struggling to keep up with debt repayments, a high number of people struggling to manage their finances effectively, and a record number of bankruptcy and IVA applications being filed, schools in the UK are trying to address the issue of consumers debt at its roots by educating youngsters in how to manage finances. At present, children aged just eleven and upwards are being taught about effective financing, which should give them valuable skills and knowledge for the future and could help them to avoid the levels of debt that many of today’s adults are having to deal with.

One school in Pickering, Yorkshire is already enjoying the benefits of this addition to the curriculum, and students seem to find it very useful. The school is working with the Personal Finance Education Group, which aims to bring a better grasp of personal finance into the national curriculum, aided by fifteen million pounds in funding from the Financial Services Authority.

The Regional Director of the Personal Finance Education Group stated: “It’s helping them understand what financial information they need and then how to apply it. If you look what the financial situation looks like for the under-40s it is very different to the way it was some twenty or thirty years ago. A young person aged 18 can clock up credit cards at an alarming rate without much reference to their financial situation and
the important thing is to let people know how to manage their financial situation.”

The children at the school have had some very positive things to say about the new aspect of education that they are receiving, and many are already aware of how this type of additional education could help them in the future.