After years of pressure from legislators to make financial literacy a graduation requirement, the Hawaii Department of Education is considering changing high school students’ personal transition plans for the first time in more than 15 years.

Financial literacy aims to help students manage their money and financial decisions and may include lessons on spending and saving, investing and borrowing money.

Starting next academic year, the department has committed to piloting a transition plan that includes financial literacy and a greater emphasis on college and career planning. The plans task students with researching career and academic interests, completing personal statements and building resumes as early as their freshman year.

But some students and education advocates say schools need to do more to make the process engaging and meaningful for high schoolers before introducing new requirements.

“It seems like a really good concept but is used pretty inconsistently across the system,” said David Sun-Miyashiro, executive director of HawaiiKidsCAN.

DOE guidelines outlining the basic components of personal transition plans haven’t changed since 2007. Counselors and administrators are responsible for ensuring that students complete their plans by the first semester of their senior year to fulfill DOE’s graduation requirement.

While some students are reluctant to work on their plans, it’s rare that they don’t complete them by graduation, said James Campbell High School Principal Jon Henry Lee.

“I feel fairly strongly that we owe it to students to figure out how to make financial literacy accessible.”

David Sun-Miyashiro

Hawaii schools offer electives related to financial literacy, but high schoolers aren’t required to take these courses to graduate. At least 15 states mandate financial literacy in high school, either through stand-alone courses or integrating lessons on personal finance and economics into other core classes.

Lawmakers have unsuccessfully attempted to incorporate financial literacy into Hawaii schools’ curriculum for years, either by requiring it in students’ transition plans or creating a separate, mandatory class.

In last month’s hearing for recent appointees to the Hawaii Board of Education, Sen. Donna Kim said financial literacy is especially important to help students cope with Hawaii’s rising costs of living and make smart decisions about the loans they may need to take out for college.

“I don’t know if we’re placing the right emphasis on what should be taught in kindergarten through high school,” Kim said.

‘It’s Not Just Busywork’

McKinley High School junior Malia Manuel said she’s thinking about life after graduation, but her transition plan hasn’t played a large part in that. She only receives assignments related to the transition plan once a month, and the work can feel tedious, she said

“It’s not been a big thing for us to think about,” Manuel said. 

Lynsey Bow, counseling program director for Hawaii P-20 Partnerships for Education, said she often sees students who only begin considering their job and college options in the final months of their senior year. They should actually be thinking about their future in their freshman year, even if their plans change over time, she said.

Personal transition plans are a good way to get students on track, but not all high schoolers recognize the importance of the plans, she said. 

“It’s become more of a checkbox, I think,” Bow said. 

At Kohala High School, counselor Erin Henderson oversees the transition plans for all students in grades nine to 12.

The Big Island school tries to help them see the real-life applications of the plans by adding components that aren’t in DOE guidelines, like completing a mock job interview in senior year and applying to at least one college before graduation. Teachers provide feedback on assignments like writing resumes and personal statements, ensuring that students put some level of effort into developing their plans, Henderson said.

Still, it’s hard to make students take their plans seriously, especially when there’s no specific class requiring sophomores and juniors to work on their plans, she said. Freshmen and seniors have more instruction and time to develop their plans in the transition classes Kohala High requires them to take at the start and end of high school. 

“This is a real thing, it’s not just busywork,” Henderson said.

A Pilot Program For Now

At Campbell High, students complete their personal transition plans in hour-long, monthly classes. These include lessons on financial literacy, such as learning about checking and savings accounts and how to complete financial aid forms for college, said Lee, the principal.

Other schools across the state could follow Campbell’s lead. On Thursday, the Board of Education will consider policy recommendations developed by a task force on financial literacy that convened earlier this year. One of its proposals is to include financial literacy in student transition plans.

The department has already committed to piloting a transition plan which includes a financial literacy component next school year, according to its strategic implementation plan.

Sun-Miyashiro, who served on BOE’s task force, said schools could incorporate financial literacy into their transition plans by requiring students to complete related online modules or including information about college affordability and financial aid into larger discussions about higher education.

But some members of the task force raised concerns that educators responsible for overseeing student transition plans may be unqualified to teach financial literacy, or that students would receive insufficient exposure to the subject through the plans alone.

“I feel fairly strongly that we owe it to students to figure out how to make financial literacy accessible,” Sun-Miyashiro said, adding that he would like to see schools take the next step of requiring stand-alone financial literacy classes within the next 10 years.

At a small school like Kohala High, it’s already difficult to provide all the courses students need for graduation, Henderson said. It could be challenging for students to fit a new class into their schedules or expand the requirements of their personal transition plans, she added. 

Some students are more optimistic about what a new transition plan could bring. Kiara Pajarillo, a junior at McKinley High School, said she’s learned some valuable skills from completing her plan, such as how to fill out a pay stub and format a resume. Moving forward, she would like to see a class explaining the plan’s requirements in greater detail and offering more lessons on financial literacy. 

“I feel like personal transition plans give you somewhat real life experience in high school,” Pajarillo said.

Civil Beat’s education reporting is supported by a grant from Chamberlin Family Philanthropy.