First National Bank & Trust’s Financial Literacy Committee (L-R): Barbara Cromell, Controller; Michael Morgan, AFIM, Trust & Wealth Management Director; Dale Cook, Commercial Lender; Lisa Bosley, Retail Lender; Matthew Lutz, CFO; Mindey Fayas, Branch Manager. Not pictured: Steve Bartolac, Digital Strategy and Innovation Officer.
First National Bank & Trust has recently introduced a financial literacy program for local high school students, providing a professional business perspective on personal finance, banking, and economics concepts.
According to the American Banking Association[i], Generation Z (those born between 1997-2012) will have the highest rate of student debt, and have a general lack of knowledge in tracking spending, budgeting and credit scores.
We wanted to contribute to our community with a financial literacy program, and along with it came an excellent volunteering opportunity for our bank employees. In the program’s first year, it has provided a learning curve for us in designing lesson plans and presentations for the entire 2019-2020 school year. We are working with teachers at both Kingsford and Iron Mountain high schools in conjunction with their Personal Finance and Economics courses, tailoring our presentations to suit each school’s student needs.
In these financial literacy presentations, students are educated on how to make wise financial decisions so they can build a good financial future. Our classroom visits provide an overview and Q&A session on topics such as:
- Investing in your Future
- Definition, stages, causes, and controlling factors of the Business Cycle
- How the Business Cycle impacts the students currently and into the future
- The importance of saving for retirement and how to start the process early in their working years
- Budgeting and Financial Statements
- Planning a realistic budget to attain financial goals
- Preparing personal financial statements
- Understanding business financial statements
- Relating these concepts with everyday examples of how to budget and plan upon college graduation
- Credit Scores, Personal and Business Loans
- The value of having good credit
- Applying for a personal loan or mortgage
- The basics of starting and financing your own business
- General Day-to-Day Banking
- Checking and savings accounts
- The importance of reconciling checking accounts
- Debit and credit card usage with best practices examples
- Online and Mobile Banking
- Bill pay, transferring funds, tracking transactions
- Banking apps (digital wallets, P2P payments and other mobile banking apps)
- Online best practices- identity theft protection and safety
Introducing these concepts at an early age helps these students make educated decisions in managing their finances now and into the future. All of the lessons presented are based on training materials, from sources such as the American Banking Association’s Get Smart About Credit program and classroom texts. Combined with the real-life experience of our bankers, we have been able to create a well-rounded and relatable learning experience. Working with the teachers and students of our local schools has been a wonderful experience and we plan to expand our Financial Literacy program for the 2020-2021 school year.
[i] www.aba.com/news-research/research-analysis/get-smart-about-credit-benefits
