Gender and Student Achievement in Personal Finance: Evidence from Keys to Financial Success
In this chapter, we examine the performance of male and female students participating in a unique and successful high school programme called Keys to Financial Success. After carefully discussing the programme’s characteristics, curriculum and teacher tra
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Gender and Student Achievement in Personal Finance: Evidence from Keys to Financial Success Andrew T. Hill and Carlos J. Asarta
Abstract In this chapter, we examine the performance of male and female students participating in a unique and successful high school programme called Keys to Financial Success. After carefully discussing the programme’s characteristics, curriculum and teacher training, we examine the Financial Fitness for Life High School Test (FFFL-HS) results from 965 students enrolled in a one-semester Keys course and discover no gender gap at the overall pre-test level. We find, however, a significant gender gap favouring female students at the overall post-test level, a finding consistent with the results from the norming of the FFFL-HS Test.
Keywords Gender gap Financial literacy Financial Fitness for Life K-12
35.1
Financial education Assessment
Introduction
The gender question has received significant attention in personal finance education, with findings typically indicating a gender gap in personal finance knowledge favouring male students (Hanna et al. 2010). There are, however, a handful of research studies showing that male and female students are capable of performing equally well in personal finance (i.e. Walstad et al. 2010). While gender-neutrality may be the result of well-designed, administered and evaluated financial education
The views expressed in this chapter are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia or the Federal Reserve System. A.T. Hill Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, USA C.J. Asarta (&) Department of Economics, University of Delaware, 102 Alfred Lerner Hall, Newark DE 19716, USA e-mail: [email protected] © Springer Science+Business Media Singapore 2016 C. Aprea et al. (eds.), International Handbook of Financial Literacy, DOI 10.1007/978-981-10-0360-8_35
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programmes, such programmes are difficult to find even with the increased attention placed on financial literacy since the global financial crisis of 2007–2009 (Asarta et al. 2014). So, what staple characteristics make personal finance programmes effective? According to Fox et al. (2005), successful programmes should be grounded in the five-tiered application and evaluation approach first suggested by Jacobs (1988). Jacobs’ approach emphasizes the need for clearly defined content delivered by properly trained teachers, and an evaluation process focused on rigorously measuring pre- and post-test results collected using valid and reliable measures of student understanding. In this chapter, we first discuss the characteristics of a unique and effective high school programme called Keys to Financial Success, emphasizing its curriculum and teacher training programme. Then, we examine the performance of male and female students participating in one-semester Keys courses using pre- and post-test results from the Financial Fitness for Life High School Test (FFFL-HS). We discover that female students perform signific
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