Collection of Educational Programs and Tools
We have developed and assembled the following collection of programs and tools to help eradicate the lack of financial awareness along with financial illiteracy epidemic.
We have divided our program materials into the following categories
- Family
- Pre-College
- University / College
- Workplace
- Community Programs—Rural & Inner Cities
- Online Social Media
It is our objective through these programs, create financial awareness, then teach financial literacy skills by sharing the essential principles to smart money – the foundation to personal finance knowledge. These important life skills empowerment people to:
- Make wiser informed everyday money decisions
- Live a quality life without outliving their wealth
- Watch personal / family dreams become a reality
- Enjoy a financially secure debt free future
- Work efficiently with financial professionals & product providers to get the best results from their time & money
- Pass on their values, knowledge and assets to future generations to make their lives and this world a better place
- Have the highest probability to reach and maintain your family dreams while you live out a financially successful life
We envision a world where every person is well educated and has personal finance knowledge, access to the right financial advice and the skills and tools to manage their finances. Providing everyone the opportunity to achieve and maintain their financial stability, security, and freedom throughout their lives; while they pass on their values, knowledge and assets to future generations to make their lives, and this world a better place.
Should you become aware of high quality improving financial awareness and financial literacy programs elsewhere that effectively address the complete elements noted in The FA Infinity Lifelong Learning Symbol please let us know.
If you, your children, friends or family are currently enrolled in a financial awareness and financial literacy course that does not touch all the elements of The FA Infinity Lifelong Learning Symbol please share it with them, and encourage them to add the missing elements.
Exposing Kids to Personal Finances
It is very important for us parents, to introduce and expose our children to sound principles of personal money management. With our growing media-enriched environment, we are constantly exposed to hundreds and thousands of marketing suggestions on how to spend money, whether we have it or not.
The earlier kids learn about how to earn income and manage money, the better their chances are for financial success. Today, few schools provide classes on how to earn, save, invest, buy, borrow and be an entrepreneur, and financially plan for their futures. This clearly leaves the responsibility with parents and family, or our children will enter the real world quite vulnerable.
We have developed a six-stage program for educating children about sound money management. The ages used are approximations and may vary depending on the child’s maturity and what they may have already been introduced to.
STAGE 1: GETTING STARTED
(BIRTH TO AGE 5)
Set up savings accounts in your children’s names soon after they are born. Give them a piggy bank as well, and encourage them to put loose coins into it. When the piggy bank is full, count out the money with them. Then, take them to a bank, credit union or brokerage firm and deposit the coins into their account.
Begin talking to your children about money and purchasing. When you go to the marketplace or store, show them how you trade money for merchandise. As your children begin to grasp these concepts, encourage them to make some financial decisions for their own purchases, such as what food, clothing, toys and sweets to buy.
Also, set up an educational savings fund and encourage grandparents and family to assist. The cost of a quality education has soared in recent years. If it continues to increase at the same rate, higher education will be available only for those who plan ahead with the entire family unit.
STAGE 2: FIRST INCOME
(AGES 5 TO 8)
Begin giving your children a regular allowance. Start with a modest allowance – GH₵ 0.50 to GH₵1 or ($0.05 to $0.50) for starters – on a weekly basis and increase it over time. Discuss the options for their allowance: saving versus buying things versus giving. Do not take their allowance away as a punishment, and do not link it to household chores. Allowance should serve as a money-orientation aid rather than a behavior manipulation tool.
STAGE 3: FIRST BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY
(AGES 8 TO 11)
Give your children opportunities to earn more money. If you are a small-business owner, allow them to do work for you to earn money. Also, a lot can be said for the entrepreneurship of the front-yard Ice Cream stand, lawn mowing, or an online business such as an eBay business; this can be fun and profitable for the entire family.
Encourage them to play money games such as monopoly, the game of life, monopoly junior, cash flow 101 and pay day among others that involve the buying and selling of items. Discuss how you assess the alternatives: Why would you pay this amount of money for this item? Is it a necessity? Is it better to save? Is there a better way of buying it?
STAGE 4: FIRST BUDGET
(AGES 11 TO 14)
At this age, children can begin learning to budget their own needs. Talk to them about a food and clothing allowance and saving for future cash needs like a new iPod, a computer, a bike, college, a car, home, among others. Teach them to begin defining their goals, organizing their finances, and developing strategies to reach those goals.
As taxes are unavoidable, discuss taxation with your children, and walk them through the process of filing tax returns.
Consider giving them holiday and birthday gifts of stock or mutual fund shares. This provides an opportunity to expose your children to the stock market, bonds, Certificate of Deposits, Treasury bills, among others. Take them on a field trip to visit your financial advisers – the accountant, attorney, insurance agent, financial planner and stockbroker.
STAGE 5: GETTING READY FOR THE REAL WORLD
(AGES 14 TO 17)
Encourage your children to get an after-school or summer job so they better understand how money is earned and what to do with it. Have them open a checking account for their earnings and teach them to balance it. Since they are earning their own money, ask them to start paying some of their own expenses for social outings and personal expenditures.
With their new earnings encourage them, and if needed with other family members support, to set up and begin to fully fund their retirement saving account.
If they are headed for college, help them contact the schools they are considering to investigate expenses and scholarship opportunities. Now is also the time to begin exposing them to career opportunities with different earning potentials.
At this age, it is also important to help children start setting long-range objectives: the type of job they might desire (this is important to help match how they enjoy spending their time and the earning potential with that type of work), the amount of money they would like to earn, and the kind of house they would like to live in. These discussions help them understand that their first jobs and their first house will probably not be like Mom and Dad’s. However, through good work, planning and sound money management, they can reach their goals over time.
STAGE 6: ENTERING THE OUTSIDE WORLD
(AGE 17 & BEYOND)
Continue to help your children with career counseling. This is so very important from an economic perspective and for your child happiness. Make sure they have a clear understanding of the choices available to them. This information should come from real-life experiences or reliable sources, as a parent’s, family members or friends’ personal experiences; television programs and movies often give a distorted view of life and various employment and financial situations.
After they leave home or graduate from college, work with your children to develop their annual household budgets. Help them establish credit by getting a family credit card or other forms of digital currency. Discuss the importance of not abusing their credit or tools, such as when they should pay it off versus when they should not.
Work with them on their major expenditures – computers, phones, cars, furnishings and dwellings. Do not let them get into deep debt; help them to live within their means.
Introduce them to estate and gift planning and help them to put together their first set of documents. This usually will include a will, power of attorney for asset management, and a power of attorney for healthcare sometimes known as an Advance Healthcare Directive.
Give your family members the TFAF – Personal Finance Publication Set – the gift of financial knowledge – and encourage them to establish a systematic approach to managing their finances based on their short-term, intermediate, and long-term personal goals.
By following these suggestions and incorporating your own real-world experiences, you can give your children a very valuable gift – a true head start on ‘smart money management.’
It’s very important for us parents, to introduce and expose our children to sound principles of personal money management. With our media enriched environment, we’re constantly exposed to thousands of marketing suggestions on how to spend money, whether we have it or not.
Date Wtitten 2022
Share this information with your friends. If their kids are older, suggest they move through the stages more quickly.
TFAF- The Your financial PARTNER Educational Program™ Executive Summary & Overview
The Your financial PARTNER University College Program Executive Summary & Overview
Universities and Colleges are in a strategic position to materially improve the lives of its students, alumni, faculty and administrative personnel, and supporters. This happens through their current education programs and through a new addition to life-long learning and a life-long connection to the people that make up their community.
By providing graduating students, faculty and administrative personnel, alumni, and supporters (The Community) access to the Your financial PARTNER University College Program you are building a lifelong bond and social media connection while giving your community the secrets of smart money and essential principles to smart money management – the foundation to personal finance knowledge. This is an excellent life-long learning program for graduating students, faculty and staff, and alumni while helping with development efforts at schools you touch.
These have been piloted at such universities as the University of Miami – School of Law, Sonoma State University, and (USC) University of Southern California Emeriti College, and Miami Dade College which launched the first Improving Financial Awareness & Financial Literacy Student Club.
We’ve established The International Improving Financial Awareness & Financial Literacy Research Centers at Makerere University in Uganda, University of Ghana, and are in development at Lagos Business School in Nigeria, and Mzumbe University Dar es Salaam College in Tanzania. We plan to link this with other campuses around the world.
Wouldn’t it be great to introduce this as a gift program for graduating students, faculty and staff, and alumni at universities and colleges you touch?
Program Executive Summary / Overview
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The Financially Green Organization Certification Program™
Financially Green Organization means “doing the right thing financially” for employees, members, students, faculty, alumni, municipality residents, customers, prospects, patrons and the general public while actively supporting and working toward improving financial awareness and financial literacy.
Program Executive Summary / Overview
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The Financial Awareness & Financial Literacy Community Program™
Numerous people are on the verge of running out of money prematurely; while many families are burdened with large amounts of student loans and other forms of debt; and more than half of our adults in America don’t have nor realize why it’s important to have a current estate, financial and gift plan to protect themselves and their families. We have a serious problem. This lack of financial awareness, along with the financial illiteracy epidemic places a HUGE growing amount of pressure on families and friends, employers, nonprofits; as well as the ultimate safety net the state and federal government. This is not just a US epidemic it’s an international one.
Here is an opportunity to make a very special gift to your community.
Share this information with your Community Thought Leaders.
