USA Funds Life Skills Helps Students Teach Peers About Budgeting, Credit Cards

At the University of Hawaii at Manoa, students can learn budgeting and credit-card tips from their peers in special workshops based on USA Funds Life Skills^®.

The university’s Department of Family and Consumer Science has partnered with the Office of Student Affairs’ leadership-development program to train students who need to complete a practicum requirement for their course in peer leadership and mentoring. As one of their practicum options, students can conduct three USA Funds Life Skills workshops during the semester.

“Students talking to students made a lot more sense than having a mother or father figure do it,” says Pamela Kutara, an extension educator in the Department of Family and Consumer Science at University of Hawaii. “That’s one of the things that attracted us to USA Funds Life Skills — it lends itself nicely to a peer-education program.”

USA Funds Life Skills is a flexible financial-literacy program that helps postsecondary institutions teach their students to manage their time and money wisely while they are on campus and after graduation.

The school takes USA Funds Life Skills Module 1, “Get a Grip on Your Finances — Smart Spending for Students,” and divides the content into two, 90-minute workshops. One session focuses on how to develop a student budget, and the other focuses on wise uses of credit and how to choose a credit card. Kutara provides training for the peer facilitators before they present the material to their fellow students.

“The peer leaders make the sessions interactive,” Kutara says. “This is the first time many of the student participants have had to create a budget. One of the things that really stands out for them is the money they spend on having a car on campus. There’s the gas, insurance and maintenance. Some of them concluded that perhaps they shouldn’t have a car — it was a real eye-opener for them.”

The peer leaders also learn. “One of our peer leaders told me he had never really thought about where his money went or about managing his money,” says Kutara. “He was really surprised by how much the little things — such as spending money on boutique coffee — can add up.”

The University of Hawaii at Manoa is located on the island of Oahu. More than 20,000 students are enrolled on campus and in courses through the campus’ distance-learning program, and most of the students are from Hawaii.

Last year the school surveyed a sampling of students to determine what topics interested them. Budgeting and credit cards were among the top five.

“USA Funds Life Skills is helping us to address the concerns of our students,” Kutara says.

Kutara piloted the USA Funds Life Skills workshops during a new-student-orientation session this summer. She trained four students to work in pairs, and they conducted five sessions over two days during the school’s last orientation session before the fall semester began. A total of 109 students attended the sessions, which were optional to students. Two sessions focused on budgeting, while three were about credit cards.

Students took pre- and post-tests to measure what they learned and gain insight into how helpful the sessions were to them. The school is in the process of tabulating those results, Kutara says.

This semester Kutara trained four new students who worked in pairs to conduct workshops in dormitories and for school organizations that request the sessions. Each pair must run three workshops to complete the practicum requirement.

Kutara sat in on a recent evening session and says, “I couldn’t have presented the material better myself.”

USA Funds Life Skills materials are available for ordering online. For more information about USA Funds Life Skills, contact your debt-management consultant.