Alberta Education is enhancing financial literacy in classrooms through grant partnerships with Enriched Academy and Junior Achievement chapters in Alberta. These organizations have established programming that is aligned with provincial curriculum and can be delivered across the province in rural and urban settings for students from diverse backgrounds, including Indigenous and Francophone students.
“Financial literacy is an essential skill our children need to succeed. The Enriched Academy pilot and Junior Achievement expansion give school authorities and teachers more program options this fall to choose from to ensure students achieve essential learning outcomes.”
Enriched Academy
Through a $175,000 grant, Enriched Academy will pilot an online financial education program for Grades 10-12 students. The pilot will happen during the 2020-21 school year, and include teachers and up to 4,000 students.
“We are excited to help empower teachers across Alberta to help students learn these essential life skills to manage their money. Given the economic uncertainty today, there has never been a more critical time for all of us to understand saving, budgeting and investing. I want to commend the Alberta government and the educators involved for taking such a proactive approach toward teaching financial literacy.”
School authorities can find out how to participate in the pilot on the Enriched Academy Alberta Pilot Project website. The pilot includes in-person training and resources for teachers, as well as interactive bilingual online courses, tools, webinars and live events for students and educators. All teachers and students in the pilot program will receive lifetime access to the Enriched Academy program.
Enriched Academy is a Canadian organization that provides financial education to more than 100,000 people of all ages through online courses, coaching and live events. They have a proven track record of working with students at both secondary and post-secondary levels, including a partnership with the District School Board of Niagara in Ontario, and by offering their program to high school students across Canada during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Junior Achievement
A $200,000 grant will enable Junior Achievement’s Southern Alberta and Northern Alberta chapters to collaborate on providing 4,500 more students with hands-on, experiential financial literacy, work readiness and entrepreneurship education.
“Junior Achievement is pleased to receive this support from government to increase financial literacy education to students across Alberta. JA has worked hard to provide experiential entrepreneurship, financial literacy and work readiness training in this province as a community-driven charity for over 60 years. This funding will support JA’s continued efforts to expand its reach so more students in rural and Indigenous communities can develop skills that are vital to thrive in our modern global economy.”
To facilitate this expansion, Junior Achievement will tap into its network of community organizations, volunteers and employees in more than 120 Alberta communities. During the 2020-21 school year, they will be able to serve more than 49,000 students from Grades 3-12. School authorities can find out how to access this programming by contacting JA Southern Alberta or JA Northern Alberta and Northwest Territories.
Junior Achievement is the world’s largest non-government organization dedicated to educating young people about business. There are more than 120 member organizations globally, which enables them to give youth a world business view, along with the skills and confidence to become leaders of tomorrow. Junior Achievement has been educating Alberta youth since 1960.