New online learning portal for financial literacy launches

RedSTART aims to improve confidence in handing money for one million young people by 2025

Posted by Lucinda Reid | November 28, 2017 | Law, finance, HR

• #financial-literacy
• #redstart
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• #financial-education

RedSTART, the charity set up to improve financial education for children, has launched a learning portal for primary and secondary schoolchildren and teachers.

This new hub will provide ready-made lesson plans and training resources for both primary and secondary school age groups. The materials, which are free to access, combine interactive games with more traditional knowledge sessions, giving a balance between fun and practical learning.

This initiative is part of the charity’s commitment to improving financial literacy and to teach children how to budget, save, invest, and give back. Its core principle is creating accessible financial education materials and collaborating with partners worldwide to give one million young people confidence in handling their money.

This is part of the charity’s commitment over the next two years to partner with more schools across the UK and allow teachers to deliver financial education directly to students

Despite financial education being a formal part of the UK’s national curriculum in secondary school, only 40% of 7-17-year olds say they’ve received financial education in school. Research from the Money Advice Trust has also shown that 1.8million young people are falling into financial difficulty by adulthood.

RedSTART, which celebrated gaining its charitable status at a launch event on 23rd November, has been working with schools across the UK since 2012 to deliver its face-to-face educational workshops. Expanding this to an online offering will allow unprecedented numbers of students and teachers access to financial lessons outside of the classroom. This is part of the charity’s commitment over the next two years to partner with more schools across the UK and allow teachers to deliver financial education directly to students.

Upton Cross Primary School took part in several of RedSTART’s Money Matters workshops earlier this year. Charlotte Moore, Deputy Head Teacher at the school, said, “Initiatives such as this are vital if we’re going to improve financial education among young people. It was so inspiring to see that the children didn’t just sit back and listen but actively participated and applied their knowledge to different tasks.”

RedSTART Co-founder, Jonathan Letham, added, “Financial literacy among adults in the UK is low and an obvious way to combat this is by starting financial education at an early age, equipping school children with the basic skills they need to effectively manage their money.”

“We’ve had amazing feedback on our interactive learning days but now we want to do more. We know that we can reach more children by giving teachers the skills to deliver education straight to the classroom and our new online portal is a great way to achieve that. We’re passionate about partnering with more schools across the UK to help students engage with financial education, but also to make sure that they have fun while they’re doing it.”

All materials can be accessed via RedSTART’s website.