April is Financial Literacy Month and Junior Achievement’s mission is to create a generation of financially literate young people
Nearly half (45 percent) of responding teens in the eleventh annual “Teens and Personal Finance Survey”, conducted by Junior Achievement (JA) and The Allstate Foundation, say they are unsure about how to invest their money, and 37 percent don’t know how to even manage their finances. Another recent personal finance poll shows that 53 percent of parents say their child thinks money “grows on trees”.
April is Financial Literacy Month and there is no better time to talk to young people about the importance of effectively managing their money, so they can avoid financial pitfalls into which many adults have fallen. While many teens predict being as or better off than their parents (86 percent), teens’ lack of basic money management skills may stand in their way. “The poll shows we need to do a better job of ensuring our kids are financially literate,” said Robin Wise, president of Junior Achievement – Rocky Mountain. “Teens are admitting that they don’t have knowledge of some of the basic money management skills around investing, budgeting and using credit.”
Fortunately, many teens do recognize the need to learn to manage their money early on, with 83 percent responding that the best time to learn money management skills is during grades K-12. Junior Achievement is partnering with the Allstate Foundation to create a free resource for parents and teachers – Junior Achievement, $ave USA. (http://www.ja.org/programs/programs_save_usa_materials_parents.shtml). The site includes downloadable money management exercises for parents and their children to do together – and free, downloadable classroom lessons for students at the elementary, middle, and high school levels.
“This volatile chapter in the nation’s economy is bringing teens and parents together in agreement about at least one topic: there is a huge need in this country for financial literacy education,” said Nicole Alley, Senior Communication Consultant, The Allstate Foundation. “Teaming up with Junior Achievement aligns us with the wants and needs of an entire nation and that feels good.”
3,200 Junior Achievement volunteers have been in classrooms across the Front Range and they have reached more than 95,000 students — teaching them the fundamentals of Financial Literacy like balancing a checkbook and creating a budget. In April alone, JA plans to bring its programs to more than 650 classes across 38 schools in the Denver Metro area.