BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – High school students across the state are learning something new this year: students will be required to take a financial literacy course before graduating.
At East Ascension High School, Lisa Hoppenstead teaches students how to better manage their money.
“We just finished a unit on banking and we're talking about credit cards, credit scores, improving your credit score, filing taxes, insurance and all that stuff. I wish I'd known this when they were their age,” Hoppenstead explained.
She has been teaching financial literacy for five years. She said that financial literacy has been offered as an elective in math since 2018, but only for students in the Jump Start program. But this year, that will change.
“I've always wondered why students who want to go to college can't take this course, so I'm happy that it's now being offered and will be required for everyone,” Hoppenstedt said.
This is the first school year that high school students in the state will be required to take financial literacy classes in order to graduate and receive TOPS. It was signed into law by former Gov. John Bel Edwards, making Louisiana the 22nd state in the nation to do so. Hoppenstead said the classes can have a lasting impact on financial security.
“States that have required this for 20 years have much higher average credit scores, so it's definitely going to have a bigger impact going forward,” Hoppenstedt said.
She believes it makes sense to prepare more students for the real world.
“This is a real problem,” Hoppenstead says. “A lot of people have low credit scores because no one has given them this information. I have a degree in finance myself, but we never learned about these topics in finance classes. So this information will help point them in the right direction.”
This requirement will apply to students scheduled to graduate in 2026.
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