Mar 23, 2022

Advocacy

UPDATE: the 2023 Financial Education Bill Tracker from Next Gen Personal Finance provides daily updates on which state legislatures have introduced financial education bills for grades K-12 throughout 2023.

Florida high school students will now be guaranteed to complete a personal finance course prior to crossing the graduation stage as The Dorothy Hukill Financial Literacy Act was signed into law on Tuesday! Starting with students entering 9th Grade in the 2023-2024 school year, all Florida high schoolers will complete a one semester course that teaches them how to manage a bank account, file a tax return, build long-term wealth through investing, and establish lifelong budgeting habits. View the press release.

This post is one of the ways we're saying "THANK YOU" to the heroic educators and advocates who have worked so hard to build toward this watershed moment in the Mission 2030 movement.

During the last 6 months, our team's advocacy work in the state included meetings with primary bill sponsors Representative Demi Busatta Cabrera and Senator Travis Hutson, as well as dozens of other legislators, educators, district superintendents and additional stakeholders. The idea that all Florida high schoolers should have a comprehensive personal finance education garnered bipartisan support with unanimous votes in the Florida House and Senate. The widespread popularity of this bill was also evidenced by recent polling conducted by the polling firm Public Policy Polling in early March. Their poll found that 85% of Florida voters agreed that high school students should be guaranteed a course in personal finance. 

Whether you are advocating at the school/district or state level, there are signs of progress everywhere. This law's signing is another indication of the momentum building toward increased access to financial education:

• Since 2018, the number of states guaranteeing all students take a standalone personal finance course has more than doubled from 5 states (Alabama, Missouri, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia) to 11 states in 2022 (adding Florida, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, and Rhode Island)
• In the same time period, the count of high schools outside these guarantee states that have made personal finance a local guarantee anyway has also more than doubled from 600 to 1,500+
• The drumbeat continues in schools and in legislatures - already in 2022, NGPF has issued 26 Gold Standard Challenge grants to high schools that made personal finance a local guarantee, and 26 state legislatures have introduced fifty-six bills to expand access to financial education (Source: NGPF FinEd BillTracker).

Our organization has committed to supporting both the passage and implementation of personal finance course guarantees. Next Gen Personal Finance (NGPF) curriculum and industry leading professional development is provided at no cost to educators. Over 59,000 personal finance teachers nationwide - including 1,700 in the newest guarantee state of Florida - already utilize NGPF curriculum, reaching more than 80% of high school students.

You gotta love seeing Florida turn orange on the NGPF Got Finance? School Search Map. Which state will be next?

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NGPF's Yanely Espinal's op-ed  appeared in the MIami Herald and CNBC noted the significance of Florida's legislation to guarantee financial education. 

About the Authors

Tim Ranzetta

Tim's saving habits started at seven when a neighbor with a broken hip gave him a dog walking job. Her recovery, which took almost a year, resulted in Tim getting to know the bank tellers quite well (and accumulating a savings account balance of over $300!). His recent entrepreneurial adventures have included driving a shredding truck, analyzing executive compensation packages for Fortune 500 companies and helping families make better college financing decisions. After volunteering in 2010 to create and teach a personal finance program at Eastside College Prep in East Palo Alto, Tim saw firsthand the impact of an engaging and activity-based curriculum, which inspired him to start a new non-profit, Next Gen Personal Finance.

More posts by Tim

Yanely Espinal

Born and raised by Dominican, immigrant parents in Brooklyn, Yanely is a proud product of NYC public schools. She graduated from Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School in 2007 before going on to receive her bachelor's degree at Brown University in 2011. As a Teach For America corps member, Yanely taught third and fourth grade in Canarsie, Brooklyn. She received her master's degree from Relay Graduate School of Education in 2013. She spends her spare time making YouTube videos about personal finance on her channel, MissBeHelpful. Yanely also loves to dance, sew, paint, listen to podcasts, and babysit her 10 nieces and nephews!

More posts by Yanely

Christian Sherrill

Former teacher, forever financial education nerd. As NGPF's Director of Growth & Advocacy, Christian is laser-focused on our mission to guarantee all students a rigorous personal finance course before crossing the high school graduation stage. Having paid down over $40k in student loans in the span of 3 years - while living in the Bay Area on an entry level teacher's salary - he's eager to help the next generation avoid financial pitfalls one semester at a time.

More posts by Christian