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This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at UMKC chapter.

Advocating Financial Literacy 

Teaching and preparing highschool students on financial literacy allows them to apply that logic in their personal financial lives. Focusing on financial literacy will help high schoolers excel in preparedness for the advanced future, lessons of responsibility and accountability and freedom for enjoyment in college.

Investing in Your Future

On the topic of preparedness for the future, by the school system advocating and implementing financial literacy to high schoolers allows them to ease into the world of spending money. The age range of 14-18 years is the perfect time to introduce how best to handle currency. Commonly speaking, most teenagers within this age group do not have high-stress responsibilities other than maintaining grades or having a part-time job. With that being said, teaching them during this time allows for high schoolers to not only practice useful financial strategies but also gives them time to prepare for the future by saving their money before the realities of bills set in for them. 

How accountable are you with your accounts? 

Financial lessons integration into high schoolers’ curriculum would teach them lessons of responsibilities as well as how to be accountable. 

When I got my first job, my parents said, “Now that you are old enough to have a job, you can make whatever mistakes you want with your money; but it’s now your responsibility to figure out how to fix them”. 

This is a good lesson for high schoolers as it allows them to enter the world of making conscious decisions—and it is now up to them to decide their level of priorities when it comes to advancing their future. 

We all know college is the era in one’s life where these two skill sets will come in handy. Even if a certain high school student decides not to attend college, this advice still applies to them, as life after high school will be an even bigger shift. College is not only a transformational time in a young adult’s life for the reasons of finding themselves in a new setting, but because it could quite possibly be the first time for many recently graduated high school students to be on their own financially and away from their families. Therefore, implementing financial education into high schools would be the perfect opportunity to learn the key tips to be successful within one’s financial journey while they still have a close enough community to help assist and guide them. 

Hello All! My name is Kyra Afolabi. I was born and raised in St. louis, MO, and moved to KC for school. I am a business administration major with an emphasis in management, with the hopes of eventually starting a company that focuses on advancing underprivileged youth. In my free time, I enjoy making different playlists mainly consisting of neo-soul and r&b music!