Economics teacher pushes for personal finance classes
Teenagers do not know how to deal with money matters, according to an economics teacher who is working on introducing the subject of personal financial management in secondary school curriculums.
"Kids are leaving school without even knowing what a current account is or how to manage their finances," said Anna Coenen, who has been teaching economics at Stella Maris College, Gżira, for 20 years but says the subject is theoretical and has nothing to do with money management.
Ms Coenen took a year out to produce educational material for her Money Matters project, spurred by the fact that students did not understand the point of saving money, often due to peer and commercial pressure, and lived beyond their means.
"Banks push us. They approve loans we never asked for," she pointed out, wanting to guard naive teenagers against these situations.
"The older generations used to save but in a short time habits have changed due to a change in lifestyle and market pressure. The high saving ratio is dropping, with people being unable to afford it.
"In the past, there was hardly anything to buy; now there is everything and kids want it all! Young teenagers tend to spend."
With these lifestyle changes comes the need to make educational ones, according to the teacher.
Inspired by Nibud, the National Institute for Budgeting in the Netherlands, her efforts materialised into two booklets for 11- to 16-year-olds, and one for teachers, offering extra suggestions on how to go about imparting the subject.
The first booklet tackles issues such as pocket money, price consciousness and preparing small budgets while the other considers buying online, internet banking, hotels and travel and planning the future, raising awareness about the importance of comparing prices and fraud.
The idea has already been introduced in a pilot project at Stella Maris College in the form of a financial literacy course for Form 1 and 2 students as part of the curriculum in the last scholastic year. But Ms Coenen would like to go further, introducing it into other secondary schools.
"The subject is being neglected and the result is that young teens end up in debt," the teacher said, determined the do something about it. "We need to catch them young, even at primary-school age!"
Ms Coenen believes there could be repercussions if the matter were not taken seriously, with the young generations spiralling into personal debt, being up to their ears in loans and unable to get out of it.
She has approached banks and companies for sponsorship to print the booklets and distribute them among all schools to be used during personal and social development classes, the best way to reach all students, in her view.
"They liked the project but the funds were not forthcoming," she said, pointing out she had received good feedback from the government and the Curia. The booklets are still in photocopy format.
From her experience, despite the little students know about money matters, the boys have shown an interest in the subject and enjoyed learning how to open an account.
"Some kids started getting pocket money when they explained to their parents what they were learning and others were allowed to try writing out cheques," she pointed out.
"We assume that families will teach their children these things but many have their own problems and are not managing their own money, let alone passing on good financial habits."
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Warren Camilleri
Jul 25th 2010, 04:25
Ms coenen,
I think its a wounder full project your trying to achieve, may i also offer you the hosting of it online for downloads onto computers as an EBOOK?
your project is an ideal candidate for my group Open-source Society Malta (website-still-being-refurbished) I too am one of those students not able to pay my mobile and internet bills , besides giving half of my minimum wage to help my family, you see most teens are burdened with understanding tax, general book keeping, family assistance, and also peer pressure and marketing for the newest gadget thinking its better then what they have, being an ICT geek i look at its possibilities of features instead of popularity to price, you do find great cell phones at low prices and you find good looking but slow at high prices
ms coenan please contact me on warren@linuxmalta.co.cc regarding your project, maybe i could assist you in acquiring funds from banks as i will soon be picking up a sponsor financially
malcolm seychell
Jul 23rd 2010, 20:37
Well done. Wish her luck
S. Caruana
Jul 23rd 2010, 19:40
Well done Ms Coenen!! Brilliant Idea!! Thank You .
Joseph Mallia Mamo
Jul 23rd 2010, 18:46
Students should be encouraged to save and not to borrow.
Mario Sammut
Jul 23rd 2010, 16:55
Best idea to ever come from any educational officer . I know of teenagers who are not capable of cashing a cheque at the bank or pay their motoring fines or pay their car insurance or wake up for work and so on and so forth . We are talking about over eighteen year olds here !!!! Who does it all for them I hear you ask? Mummy of course !!!!!!!!! And then we expect our generation of youngsters to compete in the industrial world with other teenagers from other countries. Not as long as mummy or grandma is doing it all for them !!!!!
B.Attard
Jul 23rd 2010, 14:37
Congratulations to this teacher. She is living a reality. Teenagers will be thought how to deal with financial difficulties. Better than all the rubbish they are thought during PSD.
Sandro Magri
Jul 23rd 2010, 14:19
AH!!!!!!! Finally this was one of the arguments I had always at school,you finish school and you`re out !! only little you will use of all the mathematics you have learnt is finance part of mathematics??? Especially for the early school leavers.
victor pulis
Jul 23rd 2010, 14:18
It goes to show that when teachers are given a chance they can come up with practical ideas not just theories and pie in the sky.
Gerard Said
Jul 23rd 2010, 13:34
What an excellent idea!
Jesmond Micallef
Jul 23rd 2010, 13:34
Great idea, Ms.Anna Coenen. The Class room environment could easily form a good simple laboratory where pupils could simulate a bank, a row of shops competing with products and services, a finance service centre dealing with stocks, shares and bonds, but also maybe a simple stock exchange too. One does not need elaborate equipment here, just some simple elementary forms to illustrate the basics. It would be good fun for the pupils, too. The various banks may also provide educational support in this regard.
Very well done indeed.
M Bugeja
Jul 23rd 2010, 13:32
This is a brilliant idea. This should be taught instead of religion, a farce of a subject.
No, really, it would be very useful, especially if it explained other items such as income tax and how it works etc etc.
Also goes to prove that teaching is a vocation, not merely a profession.
Franco Farrugia
Jul 23rd 2010, 18:52
I don't believe that Religion is 'a farce of a subject', as you state. True, it should not be treated as just another academic subject. It should be deeper than that.
J.Bonnici
Jul 23rd 2010, 13:14
'They liked the project but the funds were not forthcoming.'
No surprises there. Banks thrive on customers' lack of money management skills.
Anne Farrugia
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:43
From one educator to another - prosit tas-sew Ms Coenen. I wish I had such lessons at school. With some parents you're dammed if you do and dammed if you don't...some of them are never happy with ideas educators have to better their children, yet they put the blame on us if their children fail...oh! Dear! But Ms Coenen, carry on...it's a good idea, the whingers will come round one day...hoping it won't be too late for their children.
S. Cassar
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:43
As a secondary teacher myself, I completely agree with this idea.
Education at the secondary level is in fact, being give a more applicative meaning. Thus such an idea should be implemented.
David Caruana
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:32
Ms Coenen : BRILLIANT IDEA!
B Sant
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:10
excellent idea...just do it:)
Joe Micallef
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:08
That is a good "creative" idea Ms Coenen.
Some years back I had written to the print version of The Times suggesting that students should also be exposed to Marketing classes from the perspective of a customer. I think both can be integrated!
Ah! by the way I said "creative" because I am on a crusade to once and for all abolish the association, generally used by all - including all parliamentarians , of the word creative to only those efforts that as an output have things which are tactile, visual or audible.
Creative thinking is also present in such efforts! Well done Ms Coenen.
K. Lungaro
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:06
Fully agree with Ms Coenen and people working in the financial service have been noting this for quite some time since people who present themselves at a bank, Insurance or any other related office immediately show that they do not have at least the basic knowledge which in today's world can be consider as a basic life skill.
Just on point: A good add-on to this subject would be basic knowledge of Insurance, which nowadays is of primary importance financial planning.
In the meantime I would like to wish Ms Coenen every sucess with her project
M Borg
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:05
Fantastic initiative! i agree 100% with the concept and her arguments, todays mentality of "I want it all, I want it now" is becoming very dangerous to the society.
Goodluck Ms.Coenen
KJ Tabone
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:03
I applaude this initiative :)
Hope she is successful in introducing this subject.
Jeanette Borg
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:03
Very good idea!!!
S. Fenech
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:01
Well done to pro-active teaching.
P.Delia
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:00
While having nothing against this idea, one has to remember that there are many people wanting different subjects to be part of the kid's timetable but .. isn't this too much. There are people wanting, quite rightly First Aid to be part of the curriculum as well. Students are already burdened with too much work.
m attard
Jul 23rd 2010, 14:56
This is not work. This is a necessary life-skill. It's probably one of the very few 'subjects' which will be put to use every single day of the child's life.
P. Delia
Jul 23rd 2010, 15:47
So let's call this new subject lifeskills and incorporate all that is needed in it.
M.Gauci
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:00
How true and down to earth.
Anybody knows if these booklets can be down loaded?
Matthew Cachia
Jul 23rd 2010, 12:00
I couldn't agree more. This is a must!
Alfred Gatt
Jul 23rd 2010, 11:51
What a brilliant idea. Wish Ms Coenen every sucess with her project.
Ivan Vassallo
Jul 23rd 2010, 11:48
Very well said totally agreed!