State educators gathered this week to attend a financial literacy program at WVU, with the goal of educating more students about topics such as financial planning and tax management.
Amy Pridemore, director of WVU’s Center for Financial Literacy and Education, said many students may not be learning about finances at home.
“It’s really important for us to be able to educate students in the classroom because they’re not getting that education at home,” Pridemore said. “It’s usually been a taboo topic to talk about personal finances or finances at the dinner table.”
For the past 20 years, the University has celebrated Financial University as a way to equip public school teachers with the resources needed to educate students in financial literacy. This year, educators discussed cryptocurrency and Roth IRA investing.
“The most important thing about financial literacy in West Virginia is that we have to make it easily accessible to everyone,” Pridemore said.
The conference includes presentations from partners and industry people from across the region. This year, the conference featured presentations on taxes, financial planning and managing personal finances.
Foolproof, Troutwood, Next Gen Personal Finance, and Take Charge Today are financial literacy organizations featured during the conference that are committed to providing curriculum resources for teachers to take back to their classrooms.
Pridemore believes that empowering young students to be financially literate will make them more successful in the future.
“There are a lot of us who have learned by doing, and unfortunately, we make mistakes doing this,” Pridemore said. “In order to provide these students with better financial decision-making, we need to provide them with financial education that will enable them to make better decisions in their future.”
Pridemore is seeing a positive impact on the financial literacy of young students since the program began.
“I think the biggest change is that students are excited to learn about personal finance,” Pridemore said.
Finance University began in the early 2000s with the West Virginia State Auditor’s Office and was acquired by WVU in 2015.
“The {students} see headlines about cryptocurrency and Roth IRA investing, and they’re excited to learn more,” Pridemore said.
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