Teaching of financial literacy will be provided remotely through online streaming. The events will give young people the opportunity to test their financial literacy skills. The community ambassadors of OP Helsinki will coach the participants in financial literacy, using teaching material developed jointly by OP and the Association for Teachers of History and Social Studies in Finland.
Upper comprehensive schools can register for OPxRahapuhetta financial literacy events through this link (in finnish). The events will be arranged on Tuesday 31 March from 1pm to 2pm, Wednesday 1 April for 2 pm to 3 pm and Thursday 2 April for 12 pm to 1 pm. OP is also considering the need to continue arranging events online.
- We came up with the idea of remote guidance when we had to cancel the hundreds of school visits of OP cooperative banks scheduled for this spring. After the commencement of the coronavirus epidemic, we have piloted these online financial literacy events for young people and invited 9th graders from all over Finland to join them, together with the Association for Teachers of History and Social Studies in Finland. Interest in the remote teaching of financial literacy exceeded our expectations, and the events were fully booked up in just a few days. Inspired by the positive feedback, we decided to continue these events and make them available to all upper comprehensive schools starting from next week, says Tuuli Kousa, Chief Communications and Corporate Responsibility Officer at OP Financial Group.
There is a need to strengthen financial literacy among young people. According to a survey conducted by OP in January 2020, a large number of young people aged 18–24 years (51 per cent) are concerned about their financial literacy skills.
- With the coronavirus pandemic, teachers and students are facing a new challenge as teaching has moved online. We want to support teachers in providing financial literacy teaching, while helping young people manage their finances in a concrete way. Even though young people say they monitor their financial situation, the varying degrees of financial literacy show in increased over-indebtedness, for example, Kousa continues.
In 2019, OP taught financial literacy to more than 70,000 children and young people as well as guided over 28,000 senior citizens in the use of digital equipment in libraries and care homes. Read more about our financial literacy work here.