Last session, I sponsored bipartisan legislation to make financial education a graduation requirement in Washington, because it’s time our students have the skills they need to be successful the moment they graduate high school. Some school districts already make financial literacy courses a requirement to graduate, but it’s time we make financial education a requirement statewide.
FutureReady’s Financial Education and Life Skills Subcommittee — a task force under the Washington State Board of Education that is charged with identifying gaps in current high school graduation requirements and designing solutions to help equip students for the real world — has found that our state continues to produce inequities and widely varied outcomes because of significant differences in financial education programming quality across districts. When our school districts lack clearly defined expectations and coordinated support, they are often left on their own to teach essential personal finance skills.
Since financial education is viewed as an optional elective, we not only inhibit our statewide education goals, but more importantly, we fail our students. We must prioritize ensuring every student is prepared for entering employment, managing personal finances, and making financially informed professional and life choices after graduation.
Education in personal finances gives students the tools to seize and create future opportunities. The Financial Education and Life Skills Subcommittee has acknowledged that early, developmentally appropriate exposure to financial concepts strengthens students’ long-term financial capability.
In our current system, we expect our high school graduates to know how to obtain student loans, car loans, apartment leases and job benefits. Yet, we do not have a state-level financial literacy requirement for graduation.
There is community support across the state to integrate financial topics into our graduation requirements. In my roles as a state senator and educator, I have heard our students’ demands to require financial education. We must not dismiss their concerns over whether they are effectively equipped with the necessary skills to navigate their own financial futures.
When an issue like financial education raises such concern, the state board must take the right actions to find solutions. In this case, the solution is clear: Make financial education a required, integrated piece of the K-12 curriculum for all public school students.
