by: Nick Clements

Seventy incoming college freshman told us that they have never been taught basic financial literacy skills. Yet, they are signing up for student loans, opening credit cards and making decisions that will have a serious impact on the rest of their lives. Why don’t we do more to help our children prepare for a financial world that can be extremely expensive when not understood properly?

As a society, we spend a lot of time, money and effort helping prepare our young people for college. SAT preparation is a massive industry. And there are even consultants like Steven Ma, who will charge thousands of dollars to help students gain admission into the best schools.

Yet, for some reason, we do not spend a whole lot of time educating potential college students on the less exciting topic of financial literacy, which is the elephant in the corner.

At MagnifyMoney, we worked with Brooklyn College to design a basic course available to college freshman that focuses on four areas:

• The power of compounding interest.
• Your credit score and how it is calculated.
• How to understand the true cost of banking products and make informed decisions.
• The psychology of money and its impact on decision-making.

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