WASHINGTON - With rampant financial illiteracy among U.S. teens attracting White House attention and with recent studies indicating that even minimal personal financial education reaps significant benefits, CUNA has decided to make its considerable infrastructure and own efforts in the area available to a private foundation with an established curriculum in teen personal financial education.
That decision was ratified February 7 when CUNA President Dan Mica and National Endowment for Financial Education (NEFE) President William Anthes, Ph.D. signed a five-year partnership to extend NEFE's free-of-charge High School Financial Planning Program to over 3,000 additional high schools and 75 million more teenagers in 2000.
"It's exciting and gratifying to have an organization with CUNA's reputation, visibility, and level of involvement in local communities join us in meeting this important need," said Anthes at a joint press conference/signing ceremony, attended also by CUNA Chairman David Maus, NEFE Chairman Gregory Taylor, 66 FCU Vice President for Investments Robert Korthase, and JumpStart for Personal Financial Literacy Executive Director Dara Duguay.
The group had come together to underscore the need for personal financial education among teens, testify to the effectiveness of NEFE's program, and bear witness to CUNA's commitment to expanding NEFE's client base of 13,000 U.S. high schools and 1.5 million students through "an aggressive nationwide effort.. .(involving) its more than 10,000 affiliated credit unions, 50 state credit union leagues, and other credit union organizations to enroll more students in the high school program."
"We're going to take this volunteer work force with a commitment in educating young people," said Mica, "with a commitment to the community throughout the nation and tie it with a well-tested model with an ability and an organization that we think can maybe change forever the financial landscape...in America...."
Referring to CUNA's efforts in financial literacy training of an affluent demographic group which reportedly spent $153 billion in 1999, Mica said, "Recent surveys and polls underscore how many young people today lack basic financial knowledge. That lack of knowledge directly relates to financial problems these young adults may face later in life, such as bankruptcy and difficulty obtaining affordable credit."
"The emphasis of our program is saving, spending wisely, and investing for the future," said Anthes of the course that began in 1986 and was adopted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as a cooperative extension program in 1991.
Anthes added that NEFE's High School Financial Planning Program is designed to serve either as a stand-alone course or, as it is more frequently employed, as courseware that can be easily plugged into other established high school subjects.
Maus, who is CEO of Public Service CU in Denver, Colorado, explained his credit union's connection to youth financial education was that of an active developer of CU branch in a local inner-city high school and sponsor of high school financial education. "This has been such a gratifying experience over the past ten years...," Maus said. "And our primary purpose is to help assist the cornerstone of the future-the youth of America-become very financially astute."
Duguay, whose JumpStart Coalition is an umbrella group of 95 affiliated financial literacy organizations, spoke to the extent of financial illiteracy in America and to a financial I.Q survey of 1500 high school seniors that became the rationale for the coalition's formation.
"Across the board the high school seniors failed in all those four areas (of personal financial planning)," said Duguay. "The average score was a 57%, which on most grading scales was an F. And even worse than that only 5% of the students scored a C or better." -gmcorrigan@mindspring.com
