IMPLEMENTATION POSITION PAPER
Curriculum and Resources
K-12 Financial Education
Graduation Requirements
Background
The National Endowment for Financial Education (NEFE) conducted multiple interviews with key stakeholders from states across the country at different stages of the implementation of legislation on financial education requirements. From these interviews, NEFE determined the top four challenges and opportunities states face when transitioning from the enactment of law to practice. These policy papers analyze the current issues, best practices, challenges and opportunities, and recommendations for improving the access, quality and impact of financial education implementation for all. These papers focus on a few examples of implementation and are not intended as a comprehensive review of all 26 states that have passed requirements as of the timing of this publication. This first paper looks specifically at the opportunity for partnership and collaboration when implementing financial education requirements.
Introduction
The national momentum in states passing requirements was unprecedented in 2024, creating muchneeded access to financial education. However, passing a state requirement is just the beginning of an extensive process toward improved national financial literacy and well-being. Along with a highly trained teacher, one of the most important elements of financial education requirement implementation is using quality curricula. Research has shown that the quality of financial education curriculum materials may be associated with positive outcomes of financial education (Cooper, Fusarelli and Randall, 2003; Hill, 2003; Jann and Wegrich, 2007; Porter, Fusarelli and Fusarelli, 2015).
High-quality financial education is well defined in the field and is a systemic approach to cultivating financial knowledge and decision-making skills. As detailed in NEFE’s Five Key Factors for Effective Financial Education, the recommended components include: the application of appropriate pedagogy, learning objectives and assessment techniques, and being of adequate duration and structure to allow the learner to incorporate new knowledge into their existing schema. NEFE is currently updating the Five Key Factors.
THIS PAPER explores the current landscape of financial education curricula; how federal, state and local governments can support quality financial education curricula; the need for culturally relevant materials and state examples of curriculum implementation; and recommendations for current and future states implementing quality financial education curricula.
Current State
In education, the policy landscape regarding curriculum selection and implementation is complicated. The federal government has no role in curriculum selection and implementing financial education requirements, meaning they cannot mandate any state or local curricula. State policies vary widely regarding the level of involvement in curriculum selection and support. Local control is most common with curriculum decisions and implementation at the school and district levels. This often means that teachers use multiple available resources to build their own curriculum, which is very time consuming for teachers and inconsistent for students. Many free, high-quality financial education programs are available, yet there is an opportunity to improve the connection between educators and these resources. Additionally, the prevalence of social media has led to an increase in information claiming to be financial education that is misleading at best and harmful at worst. The “noise” of financial education materials continues to grow and there is a need to evaluate effective, quality programs and get them to teachers and students.
Fortunately for educators and states, there is consensus on what personal finance themes should be included in an effective financial education curriculum. The National Standards for Personal Financial Education, co-published by the Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy and the Council for Economic Education, is in its fifth iteration of a unified, national set of standards for comprehensive, effective financial education for K-12 students. The standards provide a program design and evaluation framework of an ideal personal finance curriculum but allow educators to determine how best to present the various topics. The majority of states adopt the national standards or create their own personal finance standards. As of 2024, 48 states now include personal finance in their state education standards and 45 states require implementing these standards. State standards provide a roadmap for educators when designing or adopting personal finance curricula. While no state legislates curricula, a handful of state boards of education have approved preferred financial education curricula. This level of prescription tends to be controversial with local control supporters but can also be beneficial to educators in helping them narrow down options.
STAND-ALONE PERSONAL FINANCIAL EDUCATION COURSE
While more research is needed to determine the full benefits, NEFE recommends that a financial education course be a minimum of one semester (or its equivalent), preferably as a stand-alone course not embedded into other academic subjects like math, social studies, history, etc. The majority of states that have passed a financial education requirement recently made the implementation choice for stand-alone courses, creating an opportunity for students to fully engage with higher-quality financial education materials in an equitable and efficient manner.
State Examples
NEBRASKA (NEBRASKA COUNCIL FOR ECONOMIC EDUCATION [NCEE]):
As discussed in the Partnership and Collaboration implementation policy paper in this series, partners are critical to a successful financial education requirement launch. Partnerships are important at each stage of implementation, including curriculum development. An example of an effective collaboration is Nebraska, where the NCEE assisted in teacher training and curriculum development. Using a separate grant secured from Wells Fargo, NCEE created a full-semester course that was easily accessible by teachers. This fully comprehensive curriculum—which included slides, videos and activities—was primarily drawn from Next Gen Personal Finance materials but was customized to best serve Nebraska students. “The course includes a pacing guide and nine modules with engaging presentations, supplementary activities and assessment options. The course was created with knowledge of the different learning management systems in use across the state. It can be delivered direct from Canvas or downloaded via Google. Each curated lesson decision was specific to ensure both depth and breadth of coverage of both the social studies personal finance standards and the business, marketing and management personal finance standards,” says Dr. Jennifer Davidson, associate professor of practice in economics and president of the NCEE. “The course creation was a six-month-plus process that included peer review, revisions and teacher feedback, followed by another round of revisions. The thoughtful creation with the end user in mind is the reason for the high-quality curriculum and widespread use across the state.” This packaged curriculum is available to teachers at no cost and has already been accessed by 350 teachers in the state. NCEE is in the process of sharing its financial education curriculum with other states.
RHODE ISLAND: Rhode Island passed a financial education requirement in 2021 and partnered with The Financial Literacy Youth (FLY) Initiative early in its implementation. The FLY Initiative is a nonprofit organization that provides culturally responsive financial education to underserved and underrepresented students. The financial education curriculum has 10 modules providing a holistic, multigenerational approach to understanding core financial literacy concepts through experiential learning. In 2024, the FLY Initiative served thousands of students, with the hope of ending generational poverty.
UTAH: Utah has had a financial education requirement since 2003. Over the years, the state has refined and revised its requirement to serve students better. Similar to other states, Utah formed partnerships to assist in curriculum development and teacher training resources. The Utah Jump$tart Coalition has been a critical partner for the state since the inception of the legislation. Its work with the Utah state legislature helped establish the General Finance Literacy Course, and its work with Utah’s State Office of Education helped launch the popular and well-accessed Finance the Classroom website, which it formed in response to teachers’ requests for materials and lesson plans to use in the classroom. These curricula have been invaluable to teachers across the state.
Challenges and Opportunities
With more than half of states now having passed a financial education requirement, much can be learned about implementing financial education curricula at the state and local level. This next section presents challenges and opportunities to improve the accessibility of financial education materials for educators, to explore the ideal academic home department for financial education and to ensure curricula are culturally competent.
NEFE counts states as having a financial education graduation requirement if the state offers at least a semester course in financial literacy and every student takes that course in order to graduate. States may have an integrated course as long as it is yearlong and 50 percent or more of the coursework hours are devoted to financial literacy.
FINANCIAL EDUCATION MATERIALS
Nevada, which does not have a full graduation requirement, mandates that personal finance be integrated into a semester economics course. A recent study by RAND Corporation examining the implementation of Nevada’s financial literacy requirement found that among surveyed teachers who use instructional materials to teach financial education, 90 percent reported using materials they found themselves and 61 percent reported using materials they had created from scratch (Mulhern, Kennedy and Okuda-Lim, 2024). In follow-up focus groups, teachers described the piecemeal process of developing their classroom curriculum, which often includes using Google to search for topics, pulling videos from YouTube, accessing free financial education resources and exploring other low-cost methods. Teachers use state and national standards as a guideline to create and structure their financial education curriculum, but most receive little support or resources from their schools and districts. Educators are encumbered by demands for their time and most do not have the expertise needed to build a consistent and effective financial education curriculum. Because they typically aren’t offered financial literacy training as part of their general educator preparation, relying on curricula developed by financial education experts has benefits. A wealth of highquality, prefabricated, free financial education materials is available to educators to use in their classrooms. This mismatch of needs and available resources presents an excellent opportunity for states to coordinate with school districts and provide teachers with curated materials. In other academic disciplines, states advance sound policies that make it easier for teachers to choose and use quality instructional materials. State leaders can respect local control while still engaging partners to provide access to materials for K-12 students, evaluate vetted financial education programs specific to the state’s population, and support the collection and analysis of curriculum data to demonstrate what works for teachers and students. Model states implementing financial education requirements create partnerships and devote funding toward creating personal finance curriculum accessible to teachers across the state.
Social Studies
The world of personal finance is rapidly changing with the increase in financial technology (fintech), cryptocurrency and the transition toward digital currency. Most students have access to this technology at their fingertips, which leads to potential exposure to financial misinformation, pressure to purchase crypto assets and privacy risk of their digital identification. Financial education materials strive to keep pace with dynamic evolution, and many teachers embed current technologies and concepts into their teaching. NEFE encourages financial education curricula, lesson plans and tools to be flexible in addressing current events that students are experiencing in the real world. However, teachers cannot be expected to have the time and resources to keep pace with the fast financial evolution and need support from state leaders and external partners to pivot and adjust lesson plans and curricula as needed.
HOME DEPARTMENT
Another decision point when implementing financial education requirements is in which academic department personal finance should be housed. Personal finance is a topic that overlaps with multiple educational departments yet does not fall seamlessly under one. Through NEFE’s research on various states’ implementation efforts, we have found the subject most frequently housed in social studies, math, business, and career and technical education (CTE) departments. Teachers across these departments have mixed attitudes about whether they should be responsible for the course, and it is not entirely clear
which department is best suited to be the “home department.” This can create a dilemma, as indecision on this question or a lack of clarity on where the course lives can undermine support for the course. Multiple interviewees expressed frustration that a lack of a true “home department” for the course early on in the process made their efforts more difficult. Picking a “home department” is an important step in implementing financial education and could increase the likelihood of additional state funding.
In NEFE’s conversation with Selena Swartzfager, president of the Mississippi Council on Economic Education, she raised the point that the lack of a “home department” was a hurdle that had potentially cost the program state funding. In Mississippi, the state originally designed a college and career readiness course that was optional for schools to adopt. In 2020, the
standards for this course were amended to include personal finance, and the course became a full graduation requirement in 2022 (through administrative rule change) with a semester of personal finance instruction embedded. Because the state did not set aside funding for implementation (except for a one-time COVID-19 emergency relief allotment), the Mississippi Council on Economic Education has been responsible for leading fundraising efforts for the state’s teacher training and curriculum work.
Utah, a national leader on this issue, passed legislation requiring a personal finance course for K-12 graduation in 2003. The class of 2008 was the first to take the course in order to graduate. Yet, despite having a head start on Mississippi by 14 years, Utah is still dealing with the issue of a “home department.” The course currently lives in CTE. Brittany Griffin, policy and communications deputy at the Utah Office of State Treasurer, speculated that state funding for the course would likely be increased if the course had a “home department” and said the state was exploring solutions. NEFE heard a similar sentiment from Susan Speirs, CEO of the Utah Association of Certified Public Accountants and co-president of the Utah Jump$tart Coalition. Neither Griffin nor Speirs expressed a strong preference for where the personal finance course was housed, but both said that this was an outstanding obstacle for the work.
Picking a “home department” is an important step in implementing financial education and could increase the likelihood of additional state funding.
As previously mentioned, it is not clear at this time which department is the best fit for personal finance courses. However, there is evidence that choosing a “home department” early in the implementation process is an important step. The department may vary by state for different reasons. In North Carolina, CTE cannot house required courses, limiting the options for a “home department.” Deciding on a “home department” early will clarify ownership questions and enhance the legitimacy of the new course within the existing structure of education.
EQUITY
Financial stability and well-being are very personal and individually defined based on one’s race, ethnicity, culture, geography, gender, family values, life experiences and other factors. Yet, financial education curriculum is too often designed as a one-size-fits-all for students. This is a missed opportunity, and it is important for financial education curricula to address financial biases, systemic oppression, assumptions and limitations. Financial education materials need to be inclusive, customized, equitable and culturally relevant. Teaching a one-size-fits-all financial education curriculum could negatively impact students, potentially leading to them opting out of financial opportunities in the future. Teachers know their students and often will alter language and examples, pivoting the curriculum to address what the students need
Teaching a one-size-fits-all financial education curriculum could negatively impact students, potentially leading to them opting out of financial opportunities in the future. Teachers know their students and often will alter language and examples, pivoting the curriculum to address what the students need based on their communities and backgrounds.
based on their communities and backgrounds. These pivots allow underserved students to see themselves in the financial landscape. Unfortunately, not all teachers have the time, resources or expertise to customize the financial education curriculum they create or use. In the aforementioned RAND research study of Nevada, 78 percent of teachers reported a significant or moderate need for culturally relevant financial education materials (Mulhern, Kennedy and Okuda-Lim, 2024). There is an opportunity for local, state and national leaders to improve their understanding and document and scale the culturally relevant work that is happening in financial education classrooms. Additionally, there are quality, culturally relevant financial education materials available that need more visibility, and teachers need access to these materials. State and local leaders can play a role here in offering guidance to teachers on how to be inclusive, equitable and diverse in their pedagogy and by making existing culturally relevant materials available to teachers at no cost.
Recommendations
Full utilization and expansion of financial education partnerships can improve the access, quality and impact of financial education and, ultimately, the nation’s financial wellness. The following recommendations are presented for collaborative discussions, future partnerships and legislative implementation considerations.
Implement a minimum requirement of one full semester of financial education, preferably as a stand-alone course.
Decide early in the implementation phase which academic department will house financial education.
Offer more guidance to teachers on how to put state and national standards for financial education into practice.
Curate quality financial education materials and curricula for teachers and ensure this material is easily accessible and available.
Allow flexibility and creativity in financial education curricula and lesson plans to adjust to the rapidly evolving financial field and to be responsive to their individual student needs.
Summary
Curriculum development is a critical step in successfully implementing a statewide financial education requirement. NEFE encourages states to support teachers by providing free and available curriculum that is based on standards but still allows for flexibility to tailor the content to be culturally relevant to local student populations. NEFE calls on national partners to help states break through the “noise” of financial education materials and connect teachers to better quality resources. NEFE also encourages states to be thoughtful and intentional about the academic department that will house financial education. Implementing a financial education requirement and/or passing legislation in the future with these concepts in mind will create beneficial and effective statewide models of financial education that best serve students currently and in the future.
Provide teachers with equity pedagogy training and guidance to make culturally competent curriculum available and customizable. © 2025 National Endowment for Financial Education® (NEFE®)
