Dollars and sense: Can financial literacy help students learn math?
More states are requiring personal finance education before students graduate from high school
WASHINGTON — Inside a high school classroom, Bryan Martinez jots down several purchases that would require a short-term savings plan: shoes, phone, headphones, clothes, and food.
His medium-term financial goals take a little more thought, but he settles on a car — he doesn’t have one yet — and vacations. Peering way into his future, the 18-year-old also imagines saving money to buy a house, start his own business, retire, and perhaps provide any children with a college fund.
Martinez's friend next to him writes a different long-term goal: Buy a private jet.
“You have to be a millionaire to save up for that,” Martinez says with a chuckle.
Call it a reality check or an introduction to a critical life skill, this exercise occurred in a course called Advanced Algebra with Financial Applications. The elective math class has been a mainstay in Capital City Public Charter School’s offerings for more than a decade, giving students a foundation in money management while they hone math skills. Conversations about credit, investments, and loans, for instance, intersect with lessons on compound interest, matrices, and exponential equations.
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The Education Reporting Collaborative, a coalition of eight newsrooms, is documenting the math crisis facing schools and highlighting progress. Members of the Collaborative are AL.com, The Associated Press, The Christian Science Monitor, The Dallas Morning News, The Hechinger Report, Idaho Education News, The Post and Courier in South Carolina, and The Seattle Times.
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The Washington, D.C., charter school may be a front-runner in providing financial education, but in recent years, many others
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