Ashburton College principal Ross Preece. Photo Susan SandysThe drive to introduce financial literacy as a subject in secondary schools could fail at the first hurdle – space in the curriculum and finding appropriate teachers, says Ashburton College principal Ross Preece.

He applauds the move to make students money smart but said plans to introduce Sorted in Schools to Year 9 and 10 students next year will struggle to gain traction in an already overloaded school curriculum.

The online programme is being trialled in several schools next term.

A money management programme run by the BNZ at college had been one of the most popular options in Year 10 and the Sorted in Schools programme would likely be equally as popular, Preece said.

“It’s a great idea and I totally support it, but the question is who is going to teach it and where will we fit it into the curriculum. It’s simplistic to say we’ll get schools to teach it, but we still have to teach everything else as well.”

Preece said he supported the idea of teaching financial literacy and money management at the college because it was part of real life learning, but logistically finding time or a teacher put it off the radar.

The programme, however, could find a place in the college’s new integrated learning curriculum that will be introduced for Year 9 students next year. This will see the learning across an integrated curriculum rather than being divided into specific subjects, he said.

Across many subjects secondary schools struggled to fill staff vacancies and money management would be no different, Preece said.

“It would be great if it was a must-do subject, but how do we get the teachers to teach it?

There was a dire shortage of teachers for physics, maths, digital technology, technology and lately for English teachers too, he said.

“It’s now a global market for teachers. If you head off overseas to teach you get an instant 50 per cent increase in salary, so why not?”

The Commission for Financial Capability is launching Sorted in Schools after a survey of school leavers indicated 82 per cent wanted to learn more about money in class time.

Money management and borrowing money/loans were the top two topics they wanted to learn about.

By Sue Newman © The Ashburton Guardian - 23 August 2018