Contact:
Luis Garcia
Michigan Jump$tart Coalition
313/226-7376

For immediate release

MICHIGAN STUDENTS GRADUATE WITH FEW PERSONAL
FINANCIAL SKILLS ACCORDING TO SURVEY

Michigan Jump$tart Coalition formed to increase awareness,
provide necessary classroom resources

LANSING, Mich., December 13, 2001 — Most Michigan high school students graduate with few of the personal financial skills they need to support themselves, show survey results released today.

The statewide survey, sponsored by the Michigan Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy and conducted by the National Institute for Consumer Education (NICE) looked at 12th graders´ level of knowledge within four areas: income, money management, saving and investment, and spending. Students were asked questions on a wide range of topics and concepts such as taxes, retirement, insurance, credit use, inflation and budgeting.

On average, survey participants answered 49% of the questions correctly -- a failing grade based upon the typical grade scale used by schools (90% - 100% = A, 80% - 89% = B, etc.). The two weakest areas of knowledge are saving and investing (42.9 percent) and credit (47.2 percent).  Students did slightly better in money management (48.8 percent).  Students scored higher (although still failing) in spending (52.8 percent) and income (55.8 percent).  Thus, Michigan students know how to get money and spend it, but know considerably less about saving or investing their money or how to effectively use credit.

The Michigan Jump$tart survey, conducted in the spring of 2001, consisted of a written 40-minute examination administered to 362 12th graders from schools across Michigan.
  
The survey results underscore serious concerns about young people´s ability to make educated financial decisions once they´re out on their own, said Luis Garcia, representative of the Michigan Jump$tart Coalition, a new, wide-ranging group embarking on a statewide campaign to address the situation.

"The survey shows that high school students lack an understanding of basic personal finance concepts," Garcia said.  "Only about 10 percent of students say that they have learned personal finance at school, while 60 percent learned at home.  We want to make personal financial education as obvious a curriculum need as history and science."

Students who participated in the Stock Market Game, a highly interactive and fun instructional tool, scored better on the survey (52.8 percent) than did students who completed an entire course in money management (47.1 percent) or an entire course in economics while in high school (49.6 percent).  Based on this result and similar results on the national test, one can conclude that highly interactive, reality-based courses in money management, that provide intensive and applied instruction in personal finance, are effective for developing financially savvy teens.

The coalition plans to create educator and parent awareness of such resources through its Web site (www.mijumpstartcoalition.org).

A press conference further detailing the Michigan Jump$tart Coalition’s mission and featuring U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow and State Rep. Mike Bishop is scheduled to be held at 10:30 a.m., Monday, December 17, 2001 at Eastern High School, 220 North Pennsylvania Avenue, Lansing, MI 48912.  For more information contact Luis Garcia at (313) 226-7376.

Organized in 2000, the Michigan Jump$tart Coalition for Financial Literacy is a culmination of more than 30 organizations –– public, private and non-profit — that seek to improve the personal financial literacy of Michigan’s young adults.  Like the national umbrella organization, the Michigan Jump$tart Coalition endeavors to increase the prominence of financial literacy of young adults, develop, disseminate, and encourage the use of standards for grades K-12 and promote the teaching of personal finance. Visit the Michigan Jump$tart Web site at www.mijumpstartcoalition.org.

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