Where did you get your financial education?

The answer to that question may soon be school. I was thrilled to read that more schools are starting to offer personal finance classes. Recently John Hopkins decided to include an introductory class for the following reason:

[Graduates] were handling the job fine but they weren’t prepared to make decisions about medical benefits and retirement plans”¦
The financial world is getting more complex with decisions you have to make about 401(k)’s and IRAs, long-term care insurance and what to do about Social Security.

How does the class work? The class is a mixture of practice and theory, and focuses on four main topics:

– Budgeting
– Saving and investing
– Credit score
– Insurance

This sounds like a great start.

I’m curious to find out where people get their financial education. I gained it through my parents, classes about finance, and through books I’ve read. But even with some financial knowledge, I remember being unprepared when I had to make decisions about long-term disability insurance, the terms of the job offer, and what rent level was affordable. I did some research and was able to make an informed decision, but it felt strange that I never encountered these topics before.

Where do you get your financial knowledge? Did you ever wish you learned some things during school?

I stumbled across a nice of 5 mistakes new college graduates make. It looks like that Hopkins class would help a lot of people avoid them.



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  • Kapil

    UIUC has a great Personal Wealth Management class as well. The College of Business also offers classes in Insurance and Real Estate. All of them are taught on a relatively basic level to have a good foundation to be able to make educated decisions in the near term. Over time, we of course will learn through our individual experiences as well.

  • http://www.mindyourdecisions.com Presh

    @Kapil: Thanks for the information. Other people have been emailing me and I’m surprised how many schools offer classes. I’m impressed to see that schools are trying, so maybe the societal effects have not been felt yet. Or maybe the information is not taught in a memorable way…

  • http://www.moneyclipped.com/ Nivek

    Most of my financial education was acquired the hard way through trial and error. School taught me to manage a company’s assets and liabilities, not my own.

  • http://www.mindyourdecisions.com Presh

    @Nivek: Thanks for sharing. It is interesting that college finance gives you skills to work for others but not yourself.

  • Kapil

    I think that Nivek has a very interesting point. I actually feel that I gained a lot of my risk tolerance for investing in our high school investment club, Wall Street Society. Students invested a nominal amount on a monthly basis and then invested it at the end of each semester. That process (and having real money at stake) allowed me to appreciate what goes into picking a “wise” investment and gave me more confidence to do it on my own.
    Trial and error may not be the most painless way to learn, but it definitely is effective.

  • http://www.mindyourdecisions.com Presh

    @Kapil: I agree that risking your own money teaches more than reading books. I especially remember voting for a stock primarily because our investment advisor suggested it instead of because I had done enough research. When that investment went sour, I learned a really valuable lesson to make independent decisions. I think the stock was Compaq…

  • Pingback: Do we need a MANDATORY financial education curriculum in our schools? - myinvestingblog.com

  • http://www.thefinancialwoman.com FinancialWoman

    As an investor, and as a parent, there is a definite need for investment education and it should begin at a young age and continue to develop. Wherein, mistakes may be made, they can be corrected earlier with much less risk when these mistakes are made early in the learning process.

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