The Victoria government is encouraging its schools to sign up for the new FLIP (Financial Literacy in Practice) challenge that will provide opportunities for students to strengthen and test their financial literacy skills.
The new challenge aims to bring a practical, real-world focus to financial literacy education in the classroom. The challenge is open to all Victorian primary and secondary students as part of the Mathematical Association of Victoria’s annual Maths Talent Quest, and will see students challenged to ‘flip’ everyday financial situations and decisions from risky to rewarding.
Students can enter the challenge as individuals, groups or a whole class and select their own investigation topic based on their personal interests.
Topics can relate to financial literacy in everyday life, for example, buying a pet, planning a holiday, exploring household costs or setting up a small business, or broader, more complex societal issues like the cost of climate change or blockchain technologies, or comparing electric and combustion engine vehicles.
Through their investigations, students will be encouraged to formulate big questions, make and test hypotheses, collect and analyse data, and explain and justify their results. The investigations will be judged by the Mathematical Association of Victoria, and the top investigations across each category will be entered into the National Maths Talent Quest.
Financial literacy gives students a deeper understanding of economic and financial concepts that allow them to make effective decisions for themselves and others, both now and into the future.
All Victorian government schools are required to deliver financial literacy education as part of the Victorian Curriculum, through the Economics and Business and Mathematics learning areas.
“Financial literacy education isn’t just about money and how to get rich quick, it’s about teaching students how to make great economic decisions for life – as well as key life skills like tax, superannuation and the role of the markets and innovation.” said James Merlino MP, Member for Monbulk.
The Maths Talent Quest has been running each year since 1982, and schools are encouraged to register students or find out more about the FLIP Challenge by visiting www.mav.vic.edu.au.
