BSP, DepEd team up to promote financial education in schools

MANILA, Philippines — The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is bringing financial education to more than 47,000 public schools nationwide to help 700,000 teachers and non-teaching personnel as well as 24 million students make better financial decisions.

BSP Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. is leading the signing of a memorandum of agreement tomorrow with Education Secretary Leonor-Magtolis Briones and BDO Foundation president Mario Deriquito to advance financial education in the country.

“The BSP believes that a financially-learned citizenry can be more effective in productively contributing to the Philippine economy. To date, financial education remains a formidable task, one that requires coordinated multi stakeholder action. With DepEd onboard in this partnership, the commitment of our educators, and private sector support, we can collectively influence every child who goes through the Philippine educational system to strive towards a healthy financial future,” Espenilla said.

The partnership covers the development of videos as tools to teach basic financial literacy concepts like saving and money management in public schools.

These videos, designed for learners as well as educators, are accompanied by teaching guides to further equip and support the DepEd in mainstreaming financial education in the K12 curriculum.

This partnership is forged under the National Strategy for Financial Inclusion (NSFI), particularly the pillar on Financial Education and Consumer Protection (FECP). The NSFI provides a platform for the private sector to support the government’s work in promoting the shared objective of enhancing the financial literacy of Filipinos through financial education.

A demand side survey shows that Filipino adults can correctly answer only three out of seven financial literacy related questions covering basic numeracy, computing compounding interest, fundamentals of inflation, and investment diversification.

Only two percent of Filipino adults answered all questions correctly. The study also showed that Filipinos lack specific knowledge to make informed financial decisions.

However, the same study indicated that money management habits formed in childhood stay into adulthood.