Can Good Financial Behavior Be Taught In High School?

[jeffrey]

Can good financial behavior be taught in high school? It can — but personal finance courses are not the answer, according to a new study...

With Americans struggling to rebound from the recent financial crisis, questions of how the public manages its money have become a hot topic. In 2010, the Dodd-Frank Act responded to these concerns by establishing the Office of Financial Education, reasoning that if individuals can learn how to make smart economic choices, we might yet avoid the next onset of rack and ruin.

At a glance, mandatory classes in personal finance seem like a no-brainer: the students learn money management; we benefit from all of the sub-prime mortgages that they don’t proceed to buy. Moreover, high school seems an ideal milieu for this practical education: an environment which virtually every U.S. teenager will pass through, typically before they seize meaningful economic clout. As of 2009, 44 states had leapt at the chance to include "personal finance" in their high school curriculums...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/hbsworkingknowledge/2013/05/30/can-good-financial-behavior-be-taught-in-high-school/

[JoeP]

I'd be interested to know what the curriculum looks like. If it is ineffective, then its content and instructional methodology should be evaluated.

Also, personal finance is personal, and a lot of lessons are learned from what occurs at home. I doubt that years of observing bad financial decisions of parents can be corrected by a couple high school courses.

[bjl584]

I'd like to see more emphasis on financial management in school. But, we would have to be careful about what was taught. If for instance the course taught students that a 0% down mortgage loan was okay, or that financing a car for 84 months was acceptable, then that would be a problem. Who would put together these courses? What would the content be?

[shaggy]

At my school they tried to teach us nutrition, too.

It had zero impact on the number of chips and sodas we consumed.

[lorraineb]

It's all in the marketing. If the class is called "Personal Finance 101" the kids aren't going to be interested at all. If the class is called "How to Become a Millionaire" and the financial lessons are all taught around how the kids can reach that goal, I assure you there would be a ton of interest even if the same general principles are taught.

[JoeP]

It's all in the marketing. If the class is called "Personal Finance 101" the kids aren't going to be interested at all. If the class is called "How to Become a Millionaire" and the financial lessons are all taught around how the kids can reach that goal, I assure you there would be a ton of interest even if the same general principles are taught.

Instead of the title you suggest, they might have better luck attracting some youth if they named it "How to be makin' fat stacks of benjies yo."

[shaggy]

It's all in the marketing. If the class is called "Personal Finance 101" the kids aren't going to be interested at all. If the class is called "How to Become a Millionaire" and the financial lessons are all taught around how the kids can reach that goal, I assure you there would be a ton of interest even if the same general principles are taught.

I'm a cynic. I'm not sure that would motivate kids.

Most teenagers I see have delusions of grandeur or fatalism: they either think they'll be making $150k right out of school, or that they won't live to see 35.

[Baby_nurse]

There needs to be something taught in the schools. Long gone are the days of even a basic Home Ec or Consumer Ed class. Most of the teenagers I know couldn't balance a checkbook if their lives depended on it.

Ideally, this stuff should be discussed at home from an early age. But since parents are failing at this stuff, how do we expect the next generation to do it right?

[disneysteve]

My daughter is a high school junior (for a few more days). She had her required financial literacy course this year. The curriculum was benign enough. It taught about general concepts like the differences between cash, checks, debit, and credit. It explained how loans work and the effects of interest rates. It talked about investing and compound interest. It talked about supply and demand. All good solid stuff from what I've seen.

Dave Ramsey also has a high school curriculum that he promotes. Of course, it teaches that all debt is evil, no student loans, no credit cards, etc.

[moneybags]

Most of the teenagers I know couldn't balance a checkbook if their lives depended on it.

Balancing a checkbook is becoming outdated. With real time balances available and minimal check writing it is a different world. DD opened her checking account one year ago. The banker advised her to not order checks as she wouldn't need them. This has been true. Thus, no need to balance the checkbook all year.