A Personal Finance Class

So often we hear about teaching the whole child. Today, more than ever, personal finance knowledge and awareness are a critical part of what it means to teach the whole child.

The first reason why college students should be required to take a Personal Finance class is to help them learn how to balance a checkbook. Balancing a checkbook is a very crucial thing when trying to manage the expenses that come up in everyday; such as paying bills, buying food, filling up the car with gasoline. Knowing how much money that is in the student's banking account at all times can be very beneficial to the student, especially if an emergency arises unexpectedly. A balanced checkbook is important for many other reasons such as being able to catch fraud; Thieves today do not need to physically

The goal of this course is to get you thinking about personal finance issues at a point in your life when you still have time to benefit from the power of time in generating wealth to accomplish your other life goals. The financial decisions you make early in life with determine in great extent the quality of life you will enjoy later, especially given the turbulent and uncertain economic conditions. Money isn’t everything, but a lack of it will impact almost every aspect of your life and those who surround you.

Financial decisions are something everyone faces like buying a car to figuring out how to pay for students loans or debts. We are not taught about these types of financial decisions and how to go about them from a young age. In the news article Working Financial Literacy in With the Three R’s by Tara Siegel Bernard, she talks about how more states are beginning to require a personal finance instructions class. In the article Finance Course Prompts Debate by Gina Davis, she suggests incorporating financial elements into already required classes.

Future initiatives with financial education can change the landscape of an individual’s life and the economy in which we live. If there is limited focus on learning about personal finances we continue to set our economy up for constant failure. There is a substantial amounts of education provided to school age children that does not directly impact their financial education for their future. In high school individuals learn

Being able to manage your money is an important skill to have as an adult, but the current education system does not make financial management a required class to take. While some people think that parents are the ones responsible, this should not be

(1)People don’t realize how much being in debt can really affect a person’s life. It’s never good to be in debt and no one realizes it until they have already messed up and then wonder how it ever got that way. If people were to finance their money they wouldn’t go into debt and they would have a better life. Our money and how much we have shapes our everyday lives, it gives a person a peace of mind, and it gives us more freedom. One should take precautions in their life that way they can live a happier and a longer life without debt.

The discussion weather or not we need credit for a financial literacy class or not has become a big deal. We all have our opinions on if it does or doesn’t. I believe that a financial literacy class shouldn’t have a credit needed to graduate. Reason for this is because High School students already have enough credits they need to get and also it seems like a street smarts class. Something that most of us should already know well enough to be fine off.

With this intention one of the most important classes in my opinion should be taught are personal financing. This will give students the ability to set realistic goals and make good financial decisions before they are deceived into making multiple mistakes about their finances, and also it allows them a chance to understand real life budgeting . And while some would disagree in providing these types of classes because it would cost more money to supply and time, it would however improve not only us but

How to properly manage money is something that should be taught to young people because it is a very important asset in everyday life. “Total consumer debt in the United States stands at nearly $2.6 trillion dollars. That works out to be nearly $8,500 in debt for every man” (Anderson). Many times teenagers are known for “throwing away” their money by spending it on unnecessary things. This is something that could easily be avoided if students were taught the proper techniques on saving and spending money. There are many different skills that students could learn if personal finance was taught in the school system. Managing money is one of those very important skills and would help to lessen the number of young people spending irresponsibly instead of

I am feel very fortunate because trough this class I learned finance concepts and tools that I can apply in order to benefit my family’s economy for example: the time value, how apply the money management strategy, the benefit of understand my income tax report, the importance of a credit and maintaining care of it, how save for emergency fund, the importance of have a health, disability, and life insurance. Also, how start planning in a future investment for example how create a retirement fun or any type of

Who is responsible for teaching kids about their own money? It should really be the kid’s parent or relative. Though a lot of adults don’t know much about it so they don’t know how to teach it. This is why we have so much credit card debt in the United States, because adults don’t know how to balance their own checkbook. A lot of people say that it should be the schools responsibility to teach kids about money and finances. Adding this new subject would require more teachers to be hired, and a lot of schools can’t afford to hire more teachers, which would make the credit requirement higher for

While taking the personal finance course this past spring, I learned many valuable lessons that will greatly assist me throughout my life. One lesson I learned is the importance of paying yourself first. To put this into action, I will save money in an emergency fund to have enough money to live comfortably for 3 to 6 months, in case of emergency. Furthermore, this course has taught me the importance of budgeting. Using budgeting, I will make a plan for my money, so I can avoid over drafting and bouncing checks. Another lesson personal finance taught me is to pay all bills and loans on time to develop a good FICO credit score, which is what companies use to evaluate the risk of loaning to an individual. Knowing this information will help me

Do you remember when we had our first job, and couldn’t wait for that first check? I remember mine. The money was all gone in 60 seconds, as I spent it all on things that didn’t really matter. We all wished we could’ve prevented that spending habit. I regret every penny that I lost, while I had no idea how to use money correctly. School districts need to focus on providing courses that will better prepare students for real life issues. Therefore, there should be a mandatory course on, 'Personal Finance’, in high School, because as they are struggling to figure out who they are as they are also oblivious to their own financial identity-status, they don’t know have the financial discipline from home, on understanding how to manage their money, and the most financial issues results to even academic failure. There are many ways to prepare these students for the real world and money.

Sadly, the problem is that parents, the expected and trusted source of that learning often don’t have the skills to pass it on to their children. That’s because they didn’t learn from their parents. In fact, a survey by the Networks Financial Institute found that less than 30 percent of American adults view their financial knowledge as very good (http://www.networksfinancialinstitute.org/thoughtleadership/publications/Pages/default.aspx). It gets worse. Another study by Dartmouth Prof. Annamaria Lusardi (http://www.dartmouth.edu/~alusardi/policy.html) found that only 18 percent of 1,700 adults in their early 50s could correctly answer a question about compound interest. And another survey for found that parents would rather talk to their kids about the birds and the bees rather than money management (http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/schwab/index.jsp?ndmViewId=news_view&ndmConfigId=1010973&newsId=20080326005384&newsLang=en).