Coming in July: Money matters for teens

Math and/or economics public high school teachers are welcome to sign up for the free workshop, and enroll their classes for free Inquirer copies until June 23

EVERY YEAR around September, to mark International Literacy Day, Bench donates copies of the Inquirer to elementary schools whose teachers have signed up to teach the featured story in the Inquirer in Education (IIE) Serial Reading program.

Inspired by Bench’s hearty promotion of reading and media literacy among grade school students, Citibank Philippines is sponsoring a series that aims to promote another kind of literacy. It is a set of skills that most parents often take for granted and neglect to teach their kids: Financial literacy.

Called “You Can Bank on It,” the IIE money management module for high school students will be serialized every week for six Mondays, starting on
July 4, purposely to highlight National Savings Consciousness Week.

For six Mondays, Citibank is donating copies of Inquirer to students of selected public high schools in Metro Manila and surrounding cities and towns.

Math or economics teachers must sign up to teach the lessons and enroll their classes for the free newspapers. Teachers may text: SIGN ME UP to 0918-3824061 or 0922-8182942. Deadline for sign-ups is June 23.

The first 42 teachers who sign up will each get 109 newspaper copies to distribute among their students every Monday until
Aug. 8. Why the specific numbers? This is Citibank’s 109th year of doing business in the Philippines and it now has 42 branches in the country.

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, which observes its 18th anniversary this year, is giving this youth financial guidance a boost by sponsoring the teachers’ workshop, to be held on Saturday, June 25, at the Executive Business Center of the BSP office at the corner of Mabini and Pablo Ocampo streets in Manila.

The workshop kicks off at 10 a.m. with a tour of the BSP museum, and a brief presentation on the new generation of Philippine currency.

After lunch, the teachers will be acquainted with the “You Can Bank on It” module, and exercises on how to use the newspaper in the classroom.

The money management series consists of lessons on budgeting, saving, borrowing, earning and sharing money, as well as basic money matters and financial negotiations. Each lesson comes with a students’ activity guide.

It is important for Filipino students to get a grip on money concepts while in high school. Most of them will start looking for jobs after their senior year. For those who can afford to go to college, high school is a good time to start thinking about career options.

Money will figure significantly in their lives as adults. The more they know about money, the more control they will have over their future.

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