How American students learn financial management knowledge

Educators across the United States are adding personal finance courses to school curricula .

According to the nonprofit Next Gen Personal Finance, a growing number of states in the United States have recently required students in grades 9 through 12 to learn how to manage money and budget.

School policies in the U.S. are mostly set at the state or county level, not the national level, so the specifics vary. But Jump$tart, a Washington-based nonprofit, and the Council for Economic Education have jointly released the National Standards for Personal Finance Education , which schools can use as a benchmark and help keep financial curriculum relatively consistent across campuses.

Providing such classes to underserved communities — where parents may not have the experience to teach their children how to make financial decisions — can improve equity, said Laura Levine, who oversees Jump$tart, a consortium of businesses, financial experts, governments and higher education institutions dedicated to helping students become financially literate.

“By introducing these students to a financial system they may not have had exposure to in the past, giving them reliable information and providing them with an opportunity to develop critical thinking skills, we are able to help prepare them to make smart financial decisions throughout their lives,” she said.

Since primary school

Although many financial literacy programs are geared toward teens, younger students can benefit from them, too.

“Starting financial education in elementary school — even before preschool — is critical for children as their behaviors and mindsets are being formed,” Levine said, predicting it will create the next generation of savvy consumers.

California-based Next Generation Personal Finance provides free personal finance curriculum and professional development to more than 30,000 middle and high school teachers across the United States.

Courses include how to manage a checking account; saving, investing or paying for college; understanding consumer credit; behavioral economics; starting a business; philanthropy; paying taxes; insurance; ethics; and cryptocurrency.

“Right now, I’m working with my first-period personal finance class on a budget with their roommates,” Jodie Holmquist, a business teacher at Hinsdale Middle High School in New Hampshire, said recently. “You could see it. They’re all really engaged in discussions about rent, food, parking… I always love doing this exercise because it gets students thinking about real-life issues.”

Anna Takahashi, director of college counseling at Eastside College Preparatory School in California, heard a mother tell her on her evening commute home that her son was teaching her the concepts he learned in class. Takahashi saw that financial education benefits not only students but also parents. “The student clearly saw the practical value of the classes and wanted his mother to better manage the family budget,” she said.