News
California will add financial education as a requirement to graduate high school
Senate President Pro Tempore Mike McGuire (D-North Coast): “Financial education is an essential tool that pays dividends for life. There is a wealth of data on the benefits of learning these valuable lessons in high school, from improving credit scores and reducing delinquency rates to increasing the likelihood that our future generations will keep three months of emergency savings and have at least one type of retirement account.”
Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D-Salinas): “Ensuring our students have the skills and knowledge to thrive is paramount to California’s continued success, and financial education is an essential part of that educational mission. Our agreement is the culmination of many robust and productive conversations with stakeholders across the state about how best to implement financial education into every student’s high school curriculum.”
Tim Ranzetta, co-founder of NGPF and lead proponent of the Californians for Financial Education initiative campaign: “We commend Governor Newsom, Senate President Pro Tem McGuire, Speaker Rivas, and the bill’s authors and sponsors for their leadership and commitment to ensuring access to a semester of personal finance education for all California students. We look forward to supporting the implementation of this essential course.”
This agreement is reflected in AB 2927, sponsored by NGPF Mission 2030, which the Governor will sign. The legislation will require a semester-long personal finance education course available to all California high school students by the 2027-28 school year and will make personal finance a graduation requirement beginning with the 2030-31 graduating class.
Once the Legislature passes this legislation, proponents of the California Personal Financial Education Act initiative eligible for the November 2024 ballot have agreed to withdraw their measure.
College Savings Accounts
The financial literacy law aligns with the State’s efforts to prepare students from an early age for a healthier financial future. California CalKIDS Program invests $1.9 billion in accounts for low-income school-aged children in grades 1-12 and for newborn children born on or after July 1, 2022 – indicating the need for financial literacy precocious. All families of low-income public school students – 3.4 million statewide – have access to college savings accounts created in their children’s names.