pywong
1st June 2010, 01:08 AM
Student debt: Can you teach financial literacy?
Published On Fri, 28 May 2010
Teacher Jeff Balch uses an innovative on-line course in his Grade 10 business class at London South Collegiate Institute to drive home the importance of understanding personal finance. The course, called The City, is federally funded through the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada.
Jim Rankin/Toronto Star
Staff Reporter
LONDON, ONT.—On this warm spring morning, these kids at London South Collegiate Institute are getting a lesson that goes mostly untaught in Ontario’s high schools.
“You are going to get junk mail beyond your wildest dreams,” business teacher Jeff Balch tells the room of 15- and 16-year-olds, who in two years will be off to college and university. “And it’s going to be credit cards.”
Of the three “C”s of frosh week — condoms, cafeteria food and easy credit — Ontario’s youth are least prepared to deal with the pitfalls associated with the latter.
Balch’s class, however, is about to begin The City, (http://www.themoneybelt.ca/theCity-laZone/eng/Ab-eng.aspx) an innovative, 11-module course developed by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada and the British Columbia Securities Commission that will introduce them to the perils and benefits of credit and the importance of budgeting, debt management, saving money and balancing wants and needs. It's free (http://www.themoneybelt.ca/theCity-laZone/eng/dnl/The_City_Brochure.pdf). thestar. (http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/815838--student-debt-can-you-teach-financial-literacy)
Published On Fri, 28 May 2010
Teacher Jeff Balch uses an innovative on-line course in his Grade 10 business class at London South Collegiate Institute to drive home the importance of understanding personal finance. The course, called The City, is federally funded through the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada.
Jim Rankin/Toronto Star
Staff Reporter
LONDON, ONT.—On this warm spring morning, these kids at London South Collegiate Institute are getting a lesson that goes mostly untaught in Ontario’s high schools.
“You are going to get junk mail beyond your wildest dreams,” business teacher Jeff Balch tells the room of 15- and 16-year-olds, who in two years will be off to college and university. “And it’s going to be credit cards.”
Of the three “C”s of frosh week — condoms, cafeteria food and easy credit — Ontario’s youth are least prepared to deal with the pitfalls associated with the latter.
Balch’s class, however, is about to begin The City, (http://www.themoneybelt.ca/theCity-laZone/eng/Ab-eng.aspx) an innovative, 11-module course developed by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada and the British Columbia Securities Commission that will introduce them to the perils and benefits of credit and the importance of budgeting, debt management, saving money and balancing wants and needs. It's free (http://www.themoneybelt.ca/theCity-laZone/eng/dnl/The_City_Brochure.pdf). thestar. (http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/article/815838--student-debt-can-you-teach-financial-literacy)