68 customizable lessons, aligned with National Standards, exams and more.
Read NGPF's school-by-school analysis of financial education in America today
Activities
Advocacy
Behavioral Economics
Best Of
Budgeting
Buying a Car
Career
Checking
Consumer Skills
Credit
Cryptocurrencies
Current Events
Curriculum Announcements
Economics
Entrepreneurship
Edpuzzle
ELL Resources
FinCap Friday
Gambling and Sports Betting
Insurance
Interactive
Investing
Math
Paying for College
Philanthropy
Podcasts
Press Releases
Professional Development
Question of the Day
Savings
So Expensive Series
Taxes
Teacher Talk
The following post is one in a series of inspiring stories from NGPF's Gold Standard Challenge Grant Program which incentivizes high schools and districts to commit to ALL students taking personal finance courses before graduation. Learn more, and apply for your $2,500 to $30,000 Gold Standard Challenge Grant before the August 31, 2022 deadline here.
Joey Zocher is an amazing educator, teacher-leader, and science and community engagement advisor at Escuela Verde, a public charter high school in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Escuela Verde's innovative project-based approach and small school size makes her story both fascinating and practical simultaneously. Joey's school is the 43rd recipient of a $10,000 grant from the NGPF Gold Standard Challenge. Here is Joey in her own words describing Escuela Verde's journey to the Gold Standard where ALL students take personal finance before graduation.
I teach in a project-based learning high school in an urban setting where math has often been a tough subject to integrate. Many of our students come to us with an aversion to school in general, and math is typically a least favorite subject. Often, this is because students (and staff) think that math is hard and abstract. For us, making math relevant to students’ lives was the key to getting them excited to learn, and personal finance is the most relevant way to get there.
We began our personal financial journey by requiring a “Budget to move out” project in students’ advisories. This was geared to help them hunt for apartments, buy a car, grocery shop, and do the things they were ready to do as young adults. Shortly after, Educators Credit Union began coming in to teach workshops to warn against predatory lending and plan for college. This led us to realize the need to require personal finance as a graduation requirement.
Our small, independent public charter school has a lot of autonomy, so it was fairly easy to get this added to our requirements. The advisors collectively agreed that it should be a necessary requirement, and we then presented it to our board. They all felt it was a great idea and approved it.
The greatest challenge we had to make this a requirement was deciding if this was beneficial or another obstacle for our students to overcome. We are over 85% Hispanic, have 30% English Language Learners, 30% Students with Disabilities, and over 90% Free or reduced lunch, so our students come with a lot of obstacles to graduation. We want to help them be successful and not add additional obstacles, so this debate was the greatest challenge. Ultimately, we felt this requirement would greatly improve their lives after high school.
Our partner Victor at Educators Credit Union has been a huge catalyst for us. Our students and staff enjoy working with him, and he has helped us see that learning about finances shouldn't be boring! The credit union also offers our students a free online personal finance course through EverFi, which was helpful while we taught remotely.
My Classroom Podcast: Candice Matthews Brackeen, the Founder and CEO of Lighthouse
NGPF Extra Mile Award: Top 1% of Academy Hours Earned
5 Reflections on the 2024 Jump$tart National Educator Conference
Why I'm Thrilled to Be Part of NGPF
What is Mission 2030?
Join the more than 12,000 teachers who get the NGPF daily blog delivered to their inbox:
MOST POPULAR POSTS
1
Question of the Day: What are the top 3 fastest growing careers that don't need a 4-year degree?
2
Fall 2024 Updates to Paying for College Resources
3
Useful Personal Finance Movies and Documentaries with Worksheets
4
FinCap Friday: FAFSA Fiasco
5
New Fall PD Badges are Here
Before your subscription to our newsletter is active, you need to confirm your email address by clicking the link in the email we just sent you. It may take a couple minutes to arrive, and we suggest checking your spam folders just in case!
Great! Success message here
New to NGPF?
Save time, increase engagement, and teach life-changing financial skills with NGPF’s free curriculum
1.Register for a free TeacherAccount
2.ExploreSemester Course
3.Findstudent favorites
4.LeverageNGPF Academy
Your new account will provide you with access to NGPF Assessments and Answer Keys. It may take up to 1 business day for your Teacher Account to be activated; we will notify you once the process is complete.
Thanks for joining our community!
The NGPF Team
Complete the form below to access exclusive resources for teachers. Our team will review your account and send you a follow up email within 24 hours.
To speed up your verification process, please submit proof of status to gain access to answer keys & assessments.
Acceptable information includes:
Acceptable file types: .png, .jpg, .pdf.
Once you submit this form, our team will review your account and send you a follow up email within 24 hours. We may need additional information to verify your teacher status before you have full access to NGPF.
Take the quiz to quickly find the best resources for you!