I had the privilege of speaking to a group of first-year students at Corning Community College last week. \u00a0 \u00a0I’ve been participating in presenting basic financial education to groups of students for years now. \u00a0We present tips on how to set financial goals, how to track your expenses and how to establish and or fix credit. \u00a0I love these opportunities!<\/p>\n

It struck me as I was eating lunch with a colleague who also speaks at these presentations with me, just how little progress we’ve made in ensuring \u00a0students receive formal financial education at both the secondary and collegiate level. \u00a0Granted programs like FoolProof, Junior Achievement and other programs sponsored by local financial institutions have provided programs and at least have a presence in some schools. However this is often at the mercy of an educator taking on the extra initiative to add this component to their curriculum. \u00a0I applaud those teachers and administrators who do take those extra steps. \u00a0How is it, though, that financial education is an “extra”?<\/p>\n

Why isn’t financial education part of the mandatory curriculum? \u00a0It’s a necessary life skill. \u00a0Why is it that Algebra is considered more important? \u00a0Education is all about preparation and development to be the best that we can be. \u00a0Yet out of all the tools given to graduates personal financial management skills is not one of them even though money is something everyone has to deal with. \u00a0It just doesn’t make sense.<\/p>\n

I can’t help thinking about what our country and our economy would look like if everyone was taught personal finance. \u00a0Would the number of people with credit problems decrease? \u00a0Would personal financial management skills impact our country’s poverty levels? \u00a0Would \u00a0sound personal financial management result in a financially strong country as a whole?<\/p>\n

When I first heard the idea of making personal finance courses mandatory in our schools, I was all for it. \u00a0I happened to be one of those lucky few who had the opportunity to take a personal finance course as part of my high school education, so I knew first hand how beneficial it was in my life. \u00a0That was almost 15 years ago though, I would have thought by now that those advocacy groups would have successfully made \u00a0some legislations changes. \u00a0Yet here I was about to go talk to another small group of college students who still have not had any formal education in the area of personal finance. \u00a0I have to tell you I am bothered, really bothered by that. \u00a0Something has to change. \u00a0Instead of waiting for someone else to fix it, I’ve decided that I<\/em> have to help it change!<\/p>\n

I have no idea where to start, but I’m going to start asking some questions. \u00a0Then I’m going to brain storm some solutions. \u00a0(Ok, so I’m already brainstorming solutions.) \u00a0This is a problem in our country and it doesn’t seem like too hard of situation to fix. \u00a0We just have to start somewhere. \u00a0I don’t want to be speaking to a group of college students 15 years from now trying to impart a whole text-book worth’s of personal finance skills into one hour. \u00a0I’d rather be blown away by the knowledge and understanding they have on everything from credit to asset protection. \u00a0In the meantime, if you have any ideas please, please, share them with me! \u00a0If you know other people who are just as passionate about this topic get them in touch with me! \u00a0If you want to help, I’ll find a way to get you involved!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had the privilege of speaking to a group of first-year students at Corning Community College last week. \u00a0 \u00a0I’ve been participating in presenting basic financial education to groups of students for years now. \u00a0We present tips on how to set financial goals, how to track your expenses and how to establish and or fix […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","sharing_disabled":false,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[38,37,39],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/books.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9rIpx-6u","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":407,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402\/revisions\/407"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sarahcarrfinancial.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}