MADISON, WI (WHBL) - State officials working with school districts are working to help get students ready for the rigors of handling their finances.
Governor Walker's office has been working since 2011 to to improve financial literacy in Wisconsin students through the use of the Department of Financial Institutions Office of Financial Literacy, as well as the Governor's Council on Financial Literacy. The two groups have been providing grants to school districts in order to pay for those classes.
DFI secretary Lon Roberts says Roberts says the state is working to get financial literacy started as early at elementary school. "We're starting as early as we possibly can, and it's fun to see these young people take to the subject matter. They enjoy learning about money, and finance and all of those basic kinds of things." He says those students can work on things like saving money, earning interest, and planning out a budget in order to learn more about handling money.
Once students get older, they can work on more rigorous topics like managing debt and budgeting for bills. One of the goals of the program is to create requirements at Wisconsin schools to complete coursework in financial literacy. Roberts says students here in Sheboygan got some of those grants. "Those better citizens have been a benefit of a grant from our department in 2014 for $28,000 which touched over 2,100 middle school and high school students." In total, Wisconsin schools have received over $750,000 in financial literacy grants since 2012.
Officials are also working on improving the education of people when it comes to getting and handling student loans. DFI staff are working on a website to help students do a better job of planning for their post-secondary careers and making prudent decisions to help hold down the cost of college. Governor Walker also says his four year freeze on the UW System's tuition has helped students and families save money as well.