More than 60,000 secondary school students have received financial education through ‘Your Finances, Your Future’, a program promoted by the Spanish Banking Association (AEB) and its Foundation, in collaboration with the Junior Achievement Foundation, which is now in its ninth edition and is deployed in classrooms at educational centers throughout Spain.
This program is the result of the long-term commitment of AEB and its member banks to awaken in young people the importance of financial education in their lives and of continuous training in this area, for proper decision-making and the development of skills that foster responsible and healthy financial behaviors.
‘Your Finances, Your Future’ has been running since the 2014/2015 school year thanks to the involvement of more than 4,800 banking employee volunteers who have participated as mentors in classrooms since its launch nine years ago. 96% of volunteers want to repeat the experience and believe in its usefulness for adolescents.
To introduce students aged 13 to 15 to economic and financial knowledge, the workshops address how to create a family budget, how to avoid online scams, how to shop responsibly, or why it is necessary to save to better face unexpected events and achieve financial independence, among other topics.
Nearly 8,000 students—from 188 educational centers in a total of 39 Spanish provinces—have benefited from the program in this 2022/2023 school year, thanks to more than 600 volunteers from 17 financial institutions who have delivered the workshops, mostly in person, but also remotely.
The program has had volunteers in this edition from Abanca, Banca March, Banco Caminos, Banco Mediolanum, Banco Sabadell, Banco Santander, Grupo Cooperativo Cajamar, Bankinter, BBVA, BNP Paribas, Citi, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, ING, Singular Bank, Société Générale and UCI. Additionally, CUNEF students and professionals from AEB Foundation have participated in the project as volunteers.
The President of AEB and its Foundation, Alejandra Kindelán, has highlighted the banking sector’s firm commitment to bringing financial education closer to young people to help them make financial decisions in an informed and thoughtful manner. “Financial education is a great travel companion that helps us at crucial moments in our lives.”
For her part, the General Director of the Junior Achievement Spain Foundation, Lucía de Zavala, has stated that “thanks to this agreement with AEB, we can offer financial education to students with the help of the greatest experts, which will undoubtedly enable them to make better decisions in the future.”
