I am going to start off by noting that I am not an education
professional, nor have I ever worked with kids and their development. I will
also note, as with any field, there are some excellent educators and some that
are not so great. I assume we have all had that teacher who should have retired
years ago leading us to feel little to no engagement towards the class or its
content. Well I find there to be a serious lack of financial education in the
school systems, where it really needs to become the “cool class” in schools
along with shop, computer studies, and PE.
Education, from my perspective, is the privilege among
children to be taught the ever so important information and life skills to help
develop the mind and prepare you for the world. This may include information
based on future potential work opportunities, continued education into
post-secondary, or simply just day to day knowledge and understanding.
There is a strong debate among people with regards to the
accountability of who is to teach children through grade school in the subject
of personal finance. Many feel that the responsibility lies on the shoulders of
the parents. I don’t object to this statement as I feel that parents are
rightfully in control of the life skills their children obtain. The hole in
this argument is the fact that not all parents are good with their money, or
just simply fail to have this learning opportunity with their kids.
Personally, I feel that if Sexual Education is a mandated
course among primary and high school kids, then personal finance should be as
well.
Now I do understand that some schools implement programs to
assist in this area, I actually helped with some of these programs in my short
career in banking. That said, do you really want a banker talking to your kids
about finance? It isn't horrible, don’t get me wrong, there is a lot of
knowledge among bankers and I thoroughly enjoyed spreading the knowledge, so to
speak. However, there was also generally a hidden agenda to gain more business
starting with young new clients.
My thought is why not just give all students the opportunity
learn the basics to finance. I myself find courses such as Home Economics to be
a waste of everyone’s time. Why not have more pressing information be explained
in that class rather than sewing a pillow? I have heard some educator’s state
that they aren't financial professionals, and use this as justification to
argue the implementation to current curriculum. This is ridiculous. You can’t
tell me there isn't a teacher that doesn't understand how to work a budget, or
how to teach compounding interest to a high school student for loans. I am not
saying that you need to start explaining derivatives trading in foreign
markets, I am saying show them how to live within their means, how to open a
bank account, how to count money! (Might I add, no child under 18 years old
that came to see me in banking knew how to sign their name, so teach them
cursive too!)
The fact of the matter is this, children deserve the leg up
in life to understand the powers of debt. With the cost of post-secondary
education increasing exponentially and the pressure to take on debt early
through institutions by means of “student credit cards”, they will learn it one
way or another. So why not teach the concept of saving young so we can teach a
future generation that in order to buy something you want, you need to have the
money to buy it first.
To build on my previous sentiments about parents being
responsible, well not all parents are financially savvy enough to even
understand the basics. So why should the burden flow into the next generation?
I don’t mean that in an attack towards parents. You are not expected to be your
child’s CFO, but unfortunately, I have heard some very WRONG information
conveyed to their kids while sitting in my office opening accounts.
So in reality let’s bring it to the classrooms. We’re
starting to teach computer coding for these new tech savvy kids which I find to
be amazing, but we aren't teaching them not to finance the computer they buy at
20% interest. I know there is growing concerns of class sizes, wages for
teachers, and other bureaucratic issues that need to be addressed. But as they say, "think of the children".
I understand that many feel that kids grow up much to fast
today, and by forcing this concept on kid’s only enables that fact. However,
answer me this, would you rather they be oblivious to the content, or ready to take
on the inevitable challenges that are coming for them whether we like it or not?
We as a society need to be thinking ever forward when it comes to the future
educational requirements of children. This goes further than just curriculum,
but also the way we test and the ways we determine success in the classroom.
Educators play an integral role in child skill development and, I believe, need
to become time travelers to foresee not what is important today but important
two decades from now. But, as I said before about those teacher’s that lack
engagement, maybe they need some new course material to re-energize the passion
they had when they first got into the field.
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