I agree with most of your readers and that is why I love your blog as well. You stimulate thought, conversation and most of your readers clearly get the point that personal finance is exactly that, personal.

Most of your readers seem to have a pretty good handle on their personal philosophy with money, however, the statistics show a different story for most American’s today. Most are learning about personal finance only after digging a significant hole and making many common mistakes.

Our mission at The Secure Student Program is to help high school students avoid those mistakes.

Your readers are right on the money in these areas:

1. Parents teaching early and by example is best

2. Parent should talk and stimulate thought in their kids

3. Kids should learn about money through experience and not just more information

The information today is abundant and free, but to most, overwhelming and confusing. The statistics show that most people are actually feeling:

1. Confused

2. Isolated

3. Powerless

Too much information, not enough personal experience and action.

There are many parents and teachers that can make a difference to the kids and for free, however most are just feeding more and more information to the kids.

When you talk directly to the kids, they are saying that adults are providing them more and more information, trying to solve the problem, but the more information they get, the more it’s confusing them.

More information is not the solution.

Students today would benefit much more from experience, and that is our challenge and our goal. Our program was designed for the kids that are not getting the relevant information from schools and parents (about ½ of the country). Our lessons are relevant and designed to inspire thought and give them real world exercises to get the kids into action. We also try to teach the things that are not readily available and are extremely relevant for their immediate years after high school. How to protect and master your credit scores through the 5 key categories, how credit card companies scout and prey on college campuses and how lenders manipulate rates and fees for maximum profit with minimum disclosure.

Once they are a member of our community, they are always a member and we plan to stay in front of them throught the next few years until they have a handle on their personal plan. We need to do this because the rules of the game are changing rapidly every day.

I challenge most of your readers and adults to answer 2 questions.

1) What are the 5 key categories of credit scoring?

2) What is the average rate on a credit card in America today?

The reality is that most American’s simply don’t’ know, or worse, think they know and are wrong. If you talk with the average person today, they have no clue how credit scoring really works and they think the average rate on a credit card is 14.3%, just because they saw it on the news last week.

However, when you add in the average penalties, late charges and interest manipulation, the average credit card has an APR over 150%.

So that is our goal, to get the kids talking, in action and they will learn through experience, not just more of the same information. Hopefully giving them the direction, confidence and capability they need to develop their personal philosophy with credit and money.

PS. On a side note, we are in negotiations with several institutions to have the graduation package a savings vehicle vs. a spending vehicle and I couldn’t agree more about that.

We can’t do it alone, we have to do it together. If any of your readers would like to contact me directly are get involved in our mission, my personal email is below.

Cheers to you,

Mike Young
mike@thesecurestudent.com

Scouts do good things. I just want ‘Scouts for All’ to be a more accurate slogan.

My parents never could have paid $297 for a financial literacy course. I learned from a combination of a high school “economics” class and my grandparents showing me the compound interest they earned on some of their assets.

I have no consumer debt, put myself through college, and have a modest savings cushion.

LOL! So very, very true!

But what about those families who do not have a clue? For example, one survey, I read, stated that 52% could not describe the advantages of a ROTH retirement account.

Another survey, stated that college seniors are graduating with an average of $4,100 in credit card debt.

In my opinion, avoid the self-study program. Sign up for a course at a local adult or community college. The cost is usually quite reasonable and the classroom interaction is an added bonus.

There’s no reason I would rule out a program like this if I actually thought it was better than what my kids would get otherwise. But, I don’t actually have kids yet, so this is really fairly speculative on my part. I do know that my kids will get the best education I can afford to give them.

Dave covered most of what I was going to say, I just second him. The troop I was in met in a church hall, but the only religion was mentioning God in the pledge of allegiance. I think the only thing that is true about what you said is they disapprove of gay leaders. There is no policy related to the sexuality of the scouts, however. For the record I can’t say I agree with this, but that part is factual (or was last I knew, which was 5-10 years ago).

If you don’t think you can provide that example, spend $297 on a personal finance program for YOURSELF.

The problems you describe come from the troop sponsor, usually a church but could be 4H or even private individuals. I can tell you for a fact that my Troop had no religious ties and didn’t give one whit about sexuality. In fact we broke off a church when they wanted us to take a larger role in services as well and more evangelical stuff.

The biggest thing finding out who the sponsors are.

In other countries, and in the Girl Scouts/Guides, the membership requirements are generally less restrictive – pretty much it’s only the atheists that are excluded.

For our two younger ones we also had them read Dave Ramsey’s book “Total Money Makeover”. They are all responsible money managers today. I also second the Boy Scouts Personal Finance merit badge. The book is only $3 – what a bargain! (Our son is an Eagle Scout).

EDITED because I’m having a dyslexic day.

I think Dena Bugel-Shunra should be commended for teaching her children to manage money. They will have no problem understanding a check book and credit card statements.

Not only are her children learning good habits they are spending quality time doing it.

I taught my daughter using the Quicken program (She had her own accounts) Her checking was her allowance, and she had her savings accounts she kept track of. She had catagories for movies, candy, etc

What I WOULD do is schedule a weekly meeting/follow up session with someone who wants to learn about this stuff so that she/he stays on top of it and continues her/his financial education.

I always find the whole “I would never pay for information!” line amusing, too. You mean you’ve never bought a single book? Watched a documentary? Read a newspaper? That’s paying for information.

-Erica

What I actually do is demonstrate my line of thought daily, regularly. Also, I have given them an allowance (for discretionary spending) ever since they were old enough to keep a ledger (one did, one didn’t; but the skill was there).

Interestingly, one of my kids saved up enough for a laptop from the $5/wk allowance, the other keeps at least enough on hand to finance an entire holiday season. They’re both savvy shoppers, they both pick up change on the street – and they’ve each made mistakes which were irritating to them (but not disastrous; you can’t get TOO disastrous with that kind of income stream).

My method is *way* more expensive than $300 (in both time and money), and requires a lot more attention. I wouldn’t have it any other way, though. Teaching (living) personal finance is the *fun* part. (If I could have skipped the glitter-glue phase, though, I’d have skipped it in a heartbeat.)

Edited to add: if I told them about this course, *both* my kids would ask for the $297 and each would argue that they could find a better investement for the money.