How to Turn Basic Financial Literacy into a Life-Changing Mission

If you think that starting a course teaching basic financial literacy topics is beyond you, read on to discover how we help people make it a reality.

Ian volunteered for his local community center. While talking to late teenagers, a worrying fact started to dawn on him. Most of them had absolutely no knowledge of basic financial literacy topics and had never even been exposed to them. He knew he had to help.

He wanted to teach mid to late teens who were below average on the personal economic scale, but he didn’t know where to start.

A community college finance professor told him about the NFEC. He was thrilled to find that they had a program outlining the exact process.

Ian wanted to give 15 to 20-year-olds an understanding of basic financial literacy skills. To make it easier for students to commit, he wanted to offer just a short introductory class. He decided on 10 hours of instruction, 2 hours a day for five days. This would be enough to reach the ability to recall and reproduce the material.

He understood what financial literacy is but wanted to provide more than just literacy.  He wanted to offer a continuing course that would instill the skills and concepts but instilling the knowledge would plant the seed for deeper learning.

Considering these goals, Ian now considered the best method of delivery. In order to provide these pre-adults with a solid structure, the first basic financial literacy module would be offered on a timeline, in a classroom setting, presented over a live webinar.

Now to narrow down the topics. His target audience was close to entering adulthood, yet had no knowledge of basic financial literacy skills. Before they had a chance to get themselves into trouble, they needed to know about budgeting, savings and debt.

Ian knew that if a program were engaging and interactive, it would be easier to reach the students and keep them interested. He wanted this basic financial literacy module to be designed with principles of learning that are based on evidence. Financial literacy lesson plans that met these criteria would be formal enough to impress the authorities in the world of personal finance while also being real-world enough to make a positive change in the students.

Even though Ian planned to become an NFEC Certified Financial Education Instructor, he wanted to organize this introductory class first. He needed a certified personal finance educator with experience to present his class. Thanks to the NFEC, he found the perfect person who had years of experience teaching personal finance in high school. Ian loved working with pre-adults and now he resolved to become an educator someday soon.

With the help of the community center, Ian got 24 students to register for his financial literacy workshop. Of those, 19 successfully completed the entire week. Pre- and post-tests confirmed that they actually learned some very valuable, important skills.

Ian sorted thru the data and created a report highlighting the success. Surely this would help him gain support and funding for expansion of his nascent program.