Teen Financial Literacy

About the Program

Category: Libraries (Best in Category)

Year: 2018

An important initiative at Chesterfield County Public Library (CCPL) is to bring financial literacy information to our diverse community, particularly to teens and their families. We also wanted to establish local partnerships with schools, businesses, and churches in the new North Courthouse Road Library neighborhood. By promoting financial literacy for teens, we sought to develop a new audience for this timely topic. One of the ways we accomplished this was, starting in October 2017, to participate in a program called Thinking Money, a traveling exhibit that was geared toward teens and tweens. We developed programs that were of interest to teens, including a coffeehouse event featuring an opportunity for them to envision their future selves through the creation of a poster with an artist from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. In addition to teens, the financial literacy initiative also applied to their parents. The goal was to bring the entire family into discussions about money management and concepts such as needs versus wants and starting a rainy-day fund. CCPL believes that by getting an early start on developing a positive attitude toward money, teens can learn to make good decisions and confidently plan for their future.