10,000 teenagers studying personal finance qualifications

Financial education charity, the ifs School of Finance, today confirmed that over 10,000 teenagers are studying one of their GCSE, AS or A level equivalent qualifications in personal finance.

Earlier this week a Price Waterhouse Coopers report suggested that the average Briton is in debt to the tune of £33,000 compared to £17,000 in 2000. The Citizens Advice Bureau this month confirmed that its staff dealt with a record 1.7 million debt problems during the last year, an increase of 20% on the previous year. In addition to debt problems, there is a worrying lack of general financial capability in the UK today; 79% of people do not know what an APR is, 25% of Britons have no idea how much they spend in a week and 26% have no idea of their monthly cash flow.

By equipping future generations with the ability to make informed financial decisions, many of these problems will be reduced, a fact increasingly recognised by schools and colleges in England and Wales.

The ifs School of Finance is currently the only organisation providing GCSE, AS and A level equivalent qualifications in personal finance to schools and colleges in the UK.

Anne Kiem, Director of External Affairs at the ifs School of Finance, said: “The fact that more than 10,000 14-19 year olds are now gaining the skills necessary to manage their own finances and make informed financial decisions is clearly great news.

The feedback from students and teachers has been impressive, as has independent research from the University of Manchester. This research concluded that 95% of students taking an ifs course were able to manage their own finances.

With such clear evidence that these qualifications change financial behaviour, we are not surprised that so many schools are now ensuring they give their students the opportunity to gain such crucial life skills.

However, tens of thousands of students across the UK continue to miss out on these opportunities and this is why we would like to see Government ensure schools offer their students the choice of taking a standalone qualification in personal finance.”

The ifs School of Finance is campaigning for Government to add personal finance to the core school curriculum, putting personal finance on an equal footing with other subjects such as Geography, History and Modern Foreign languages i.e. compulsory for schools to offer it but not compulsory for all students to take it.

Current and planned Government policy does not include any statutory provision of financial education in schools, nor does it provide for any examinable financial education in schools. Furthermore, none of the existing coverage of personal finance is standalone; it is all incorporated into existing diverse subjects such as PSHEE, Enterprise Education or Citizenship which research suggests is less effective than a standalone subject.

For further information, please visit financialcapability.co.uk.