[dropcap]M[/dropcap]uch like many upperclassmen, junior Luke Harper wasn’t yearning to go to his first personal finance class of the year. At first, he was just trying to complete another mandatory credit in order to graduate. Harper already knew most of the learning materials about investing before he even began taking the class, so he wasn’t expecting to learn much new information. But after taking the class, Harper realized his preconceived notions were significantly off.
“There were several interesting things I took away from [the] Personal Finance [class],” Harper said. “Making insurance claims [were] very interesting because I didn’t know how to do that beforehand. [I] also [learned about] percentile budgeting and how much of your income should go into each necessity.”
It was vital that Harper learned these new key materials since he knew that he would need to use them in the future. Harper was able to learn the materials of his class while still having fun at a relatively smooth pace.
“There was almost no homework I had to do at home [because] I [finished] every assignment in class,” Harper said. “The [tests] were easy to prepare for because we got note packets in class, and the information on the [tests were] very similar to [them]. You could [even] skim the notes quickly before the test and easily get a decent score.”
For junior Pranav Patel, his experience with homework and testing for personal finance was far different compared to Harper’s. Patel took personal finance online this past summer, while Harper took the class during the first semester of this school year. Patel’s experience was still positive and enriching, but his homework amount and test preparation was far different than Harper’s.
“For online personal finance, the homework was definitely a lot more than I expected because I was daily putting in a minimum of two hours to work on assignments to make sure that they were quality,” Patel said. “The teacher-graded tests for online personal finance were driven by scenarios pertaining to the real world, so you had to know which vocabulary was best suited for a scenario-driven question. [Meanwhile] the computer graded tests were strictly multiple choice, [but] you [still] had to know your vocabulary for that chapter quite well.”
Despite the increased amount of frequent studying and preparation for online personal finance, Patel still had a great experience. For Patel, taking the online course gave him more control over his schedule, and it made the class less stressful. Furthermore, Patel prefers classes to be more content-driven rather than just completing multiple packets, so taking the online course over the summer allowed him to work at a much faster pace. At this faster pace, Patel says he was able to learn a lot more material.
[quote]“I learned that it’s very important to save money early on and spend less than you earn,” Patel said. “Though there are a multitude of opportunities today to get credit cards and have the ability to pay later for your purchases, it is better to control the temptation of purchasing things you can’t afford. I will carry this ideology of spending less than you earn throughout my life no matter how much money I earn because it’s very crucial to control your finances and live on a budget so that you can live a financial-free life.”[/quote] Dr. Chris Prestigiacomo, an associate teaching professor from the University of Missouri-Columbia (UMC), believes the concept of the personal finance class is vital for young students to take part in. Prestigiacomo would be pleased to know students such as Harper and Patel take a keen interest in what they learned while taking the class.
“The [topics taught in the class] affect everyone and can make the difference between a happy life and despair,” Prestigiacomo said. “[For example], if someone makes poor spending decisions, [like] ignoring budget constraints, they will eventually become bankrupt.”
Prestigiacomo started teaching at the University of Missouri Columbia in 1990 and currently teaches up to six different classes all related to accountancy and finance. In these classes, Prestigiacomo attempts to teach his own students about understanding topics such as the time value of money.
“If someone is able to earn 10 percent [interest] on their investments and they invest $3,000 per year from age 30 to 70, they would have about $1.3 million,” Prestigiacomo said. “But if they start at age 22, they would have almost $2.9 million. [So if] students don’t understand the significance of compound interest, they may never invest early and will either be poor during retirement or need to sacrifice enormous amounts of income later in life to build up their retirement accounts.”
Harper agrees with Prestigiacomo’s belief that people need to be aware of saving and investing in order to live a happy life overall. Harper says that planning to save and invest is a relatively easy process, and therefore anyone is capable of doing it.
“Saving and investing is so interesting because anybody can do it,” Harper said. “It’s really not that complicated if you learn the basics, [plus] any average person can save [and] invest their money and expect a return if they did their research.”
What have you learned from your personal finance course? Let us know in the comments below.