MoneyTime, the financial literacy program for 10-14 year olds, has been announced as one of the top 100 education innovations globally for 2022 by HundrED, a Helsinki based organisation that seeks and shares inspiring innovations from around the world in K12 education.
A shortlist of innovations was reviewed by academics, educators and students from 113 countries and the final 100 selections were made from a total of 3,488 reviews. The MoneyTime innovation was selected for its effectiveness in promoting 21st century skills required to build a healthy and productive life and to adapt to a changing world.
Neil Edmond, CEO of MoneyTime, says they are delighted to make the top 100. “We’ve received other awards but this recognition by HundrED is the most exciting. The selections are not just financial literacy programs or K-12 programs, but all manner of educational resources. The pool is much bigger and the standards are correspondingly higher.”
Edmond is also pleased that financial literacy is being recognised as a life skill that needs to be taught globally. “Parents and teachers appreciate its importance but in many countries it’s still not a stand-alone subject in schools, including New Zealand. Hopefully with MoneyTime and several other financial literacy programs being selected in the top 100, Ministries of Education and District Education Boards will have the confidence to give financial literacy higher priority in their curriculums.”
“After all,” he says, “personal finance is a skill that materially affects the lives of every single person on this planet.”
Edmond says many parents he has spoken to wish they’d been taught financial literacy when they were young. Most look back ruefully on decisions they made naively that cost them money and hope that their kids will be taught personal finance so they don’t make the same mistakes.
“International awards help financial literacy become a more accepted subject in its own right” he says.
Edmond is pleased that the MoneyTime program has been selected for its effectiveness and ability to scale.
“The program tests students’ knowledge before and after each topic. The average increase in knowledge for the 50,000 students who have completed MoneyTime is 44%. Which means on average they know 44% more about money management than when they started. They are going to be that much more knowledgeable and confident when they start dealing with mortgages and investing and insurance as adults.”
As for its ability to scale, MoneyTime is an online program accessed via a browser like Chrome, Safari or Firefox, so can be used by any child in the world who has a device and access to the internet.
“We always intended for MoneyTime to scale internationally” Edmond says. “Recognition from prestigious organisations like HundrED helps us on our way to achieving our vision of a world full of financially literate people.
About HundrED HundrED, a Finland-based mission-driven and global organisation, discovers, researches and shares inspiring innovations in K12 education. Its goal is to help improve education through encouraging impactful and scalable innovations to spread across the world.
Company Info MoneyTime Global is headquartered in Christchurch, New Zealand. Its product is a gamified, online financial literacy program for 10-14 year olds. MoneyTime was launched in New Zealand in June 2018 and is now used by more than 700 primary schools nationwide. The program is also used in South Africa, Australia and the United States. www.moneytime.co.nz
