Financial Skills Abstract

In recent years, economic opportunities and financial services have become innovative, complex, and potentially risky for low-income consumers, a discouraging number of whom remain outside the mainstream of financial services and do not benefit from its opportunities. There is ample need for financial education training. At the same time, there appears to be underwhelming demand on the part of prospective participants and the organizations that serve them. Reports of poorly attended trainings, undistinguished outcomes, and miscommunication amongst institutions on the community level led in the Banking Services Committee of the Massachusetts Community & Banking Council (MCBC) to explore the issues and to produce the Framework.

The Framework is presented as a guide for non-profit executive directors, trainers, financial institutions, and others who aspire to develop and support high quality, high demand financial education training for adults. Through the efforts of The Midas Collaborative, over 30 non-profit organizations and financial institutions were contacted; their information was combined with national research in the areas of adult education and financial education. The major findings are as follows:

1. A number of leaders of organizations in Eastern Massachusetts are unfamiliar with the process of hosting high quality training, though they do see a need for the skills among their community members.
2. Though “financial literacy” is considered a life-long process, financial education is a relatively new field, and can benefit from the academic research provided by the field of adult education.
3. From the adult education field, we learn that adults learn more effectively when trainings have relevancy and immediate application, are presented in a collaborative and varied format, and coincide with their particular life stage, culture, and learning style. More learning is gained from problem solving, discussions and inductive reasoning. Learner-inspired curriculum stimulates group involvement, resulting in ownership,
implementation, and retention. A learner-centered model of training is more effective in enhancing demand, continuity, and outcomes. As such, trainings should begin with an understanding of the needs, motivations, strengths, and barriers of the learners before the determination of curriculum, structure, or evaluation is made.
4. There is promise in integrating financial education into complementary personal or professional development.
5. Training is strengthened by knowledgeable initiators and valuable partnerships with financial institutions, philanthropies, and local institutions.

Leading theorists in the adult education field such as Knowles, Gardner, Bruner and Cross are summarized in this paper and offer significant information helpful to understanding the challenges often overlooked or unexplained in teaching new information to a complex audience of adult learners. Emphasis is made on the importance of instructors’ knowledge of characteristics of adult learners and cultural groups as a whole as well as the often overlooked affects of age, cultural differences, habits, beliefs and biases on learning. Practical applications for trainers are presented to connect the theory to the practice of training. The potential of partnerships in enriching and informing financial education training is presented, as well as practical information on the role of partners such as financial institutions and philanthropies. Five case studies from non-profit organizations are presented, as well as lists of local and national resources to produce a practitioner-friendly guide to increasing quality in financial education.