April is Financial Literacy Month in the U.S. and the Department of the Treasury and Department of Education have released results of the National Financial Capability Challenge for the current 2010-11 school year.
The challenge, which includes a voluntary online exam for high school students, helps teach young Americans about saving, budgeting, investing and other skills critical to building a secure financial future, according to a news release Thursday from the two departments.
"Empowering students with the knowledge they need to make good decisions about saving, budgeting, and investing is critical to helping them build secure financial futures," Treasury Deputy Secretary Neal S. Wolin (left), stated in the release. "I want to congratulate these students on their achievements and thank them for serving as examples to their peers about the importance of financial education."
Clearly, there is room for improvement in educating students about finances: of the 84,372 students who took the exam, the average grade was 69%, though there were 563 perfect scores, according to a Treasury web site with exam statistics. In all, 1,692 public schools and 2,517 educators participated.
