The more I think about it, the more obvious it seems that the education system is flawed.

Of course, specific courses are valuable because they lead to specialized careers.

But for the most part, the education system needs to make financial education more of a priority.

In its current state, the subjects taught have no application for real life, there is a failure to accommodate unique personality types, and it also creates student loans.

To sum it up, the education system does not create smart, successful individuals, it creates debt.

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It Begins During Elementary School

I was fortunate enough to go to a small elementary school, so I’m unable to comment on the issues with oversized classrooms.

However, there are two main problems that I’ve concluded with this stage of the education system:

Subject selections and accommodating individual learning styles.

Of course, english and math are important, But some subjects taught bore an uninterested student out of their mind.

Solution: Continue to teach important subjects such as math and english. But allow students to choose electives for the rest of the time. Include more unique classes. For example, students interested in video games should be able to study the video game industry.

The Subjects Taught are NOT Applicable to Jobbing

As I mentioned, specialized education is applicable to jobbing.

On the other hand, most courses teach you absolutely nothing about what day to day life looks like in a career.

Furthermore, elementary and high school need to do a better job of preparing students for college and university courses!

Progressive Development – Preparation for the Stages of Life

There needs to be a more progress orientated approach to prepare students for the next steps in life.

Elementary school should be explorative. It should still focus on teaching the fundamentals, but it should allow students to start narrowing down interests.

Similarly, high school should take students interests one step further. It should allow them to begin narrowing down their interests to fewer subjects. This would allow students to gain a better understanding of what they truly aspire to do for a career.

In addition, high school should prepare students for college life and the importance of choosing the right career.

Most importantly, it should begin to lay the foundation for an understanding about money. Since high school is typically when people begin working, it’s the perfect opportunity to teach how money is a tool.

Yes, history is interesting and an important part of culture. But we have the internet now to explore hobby-like interests.

Though I enjoyed history classes during school, learning about personal finance is more applicable.

Student Loans

In my opinion, student loans are the absolute worst part of the education system.

To put it bluntly, giving a student a lump sum of money is flat-out stupid!

I’ll admit that I was dumb as hell when it came to managing money during school.

All in all, students are not prepared for the financial obligation, and it encourages students to get used to debt.

In short, the obligation causes students to become comfortable with debt. And that eventually leads to feeling like making payments is normal.

In addition, the education system is flawed regarding how it delivers student loan payments. For example, student loans are typically deposited once per semester, which is not how the real world operates.

If student loans were paid logically, payments would mirror the students industry-specific career to help prepare them for managing money after school.

Ideally, tuition costs would be subtracted first, then bi-weekly payments would be made.

This set-up would allow students to practice managing income more appropriately. Furthermore, this could coincide along with a course on personal finance.

The lack of Personal Finance Classes

Personally, I find the lack of financial education appalling.

Useless information is taught instead of personal finance, which is required to get through life!

It would be extremely valuable to include courses on the following subjects in school:

• Budgeting.
• Investing.
• Investment products.
• The power of compound interest.
• General banking products.
• The impacts of borrowing money.

Moreover, education on personal finance would be extremely valuable regardless of what career is chosen.

The Benefits of Financial Education

Frankly, the education system is one of the most genius business models of all time – they give you a piece of paper in exchange for thousands of dollars.

By the time you finish school, you make payments to them for the next 10 years, but they don’t even have the decency to teach you how to make a bill payment.

Nevertheless, the benefits of financial education are overwhelming.

Not only would students be able to make better choices with courses, they could avoid the ridiculous choices the previous generations made with student loans.

Furthermore, I’m certain that financial education on the power of compound interest would’ve been life changing for me. It would’ve changed my focus and direction to know I could take a course about dividend investing.

Lastly, financial education on debt would be extremely beneficial.

Folks should be made aware of the impact of interest, and they need to understand how adding payments will reduce cash flow.

Concluding Thoughts

In my estimation, a huge detractor to saving money is not knowing what to do with it.

I feel fortunate because I have a personal interest in investing. I don’t even enjoy spending money on most things to tell the truth. I’d rather buy stocks.

But without an interest in finance, saving for anything besides a house can be intimidating.

In addition to the points mentioned above, it would be beneficial to include more affordable online options for education.

The education system should be in the students best interest, not the Professors.

In conclusion, I believe the education system will eventually make financial education a priority. Until then, there are books and an abundance of amazing personal finance bloggers to read online.

Thanks for reading! 🙂

Questions for the readers: How important is financial education? Does more of an emphasis need to be placed on financial education?