Both personal finance and economics are classes that every Freedom High School student is required to take to graduate. Due to this requirement, many students such as sophomores, juniors and even seniors have questioned the importance of these classes. Students wonder what makes it so different from other classes that makes these specific classes a requirement.
Personal finance may not sound like an appealing class to some students, but the class can be very beneficial to learning certain life skills that can be helpful in the future. Personal finance gives students background knowledge so that they are not struggling as much with understanding certain financial topics such as retirement plans, credit scores, and loans.
“Certainly budgeting and banking and there’s a whole bunch of stuff that goes into personal finance that is not easy to understand and I think here at Freedom, we do a very good job in helping prepare students for that,” said John Cunningham, personal finance teacher. “My hope certainly is that once [students] graduate from high school, and maybe college and get a job that at some point, they appreciate the fact that they’ve actually done this before and that they have a better understanding of what is required.”
The main goal of taking personal finance and economics is to not only develop finance skills but to also develop an outlook on the world outside of school.
“I feel like it’s a very important course because you need to know how to do taxes when you get older and you have to apply a lot of topics that they teach you in those classes to life outside of high school,” said sophomore Karina Motamedamin.
Many students complain whether or not personal finance and economics should remain a graduation requirement and if this requirement is fair. However, other students think that personal finance and economics aren’t difficult classes and are instead classes that prepare you for future financial decisions.
“I think it’s fair because it’s not that hard of a class because it just goes over the basics and they make it pretty straightforward and easy with the tests and all and there’s a bunch of projects too,” said junior Vibha Vemula. “I think taking personal finance and economics is important because it helps you learn how to manage your money and how the world works around money.”
