Cheese Matters; Financial Education from Ikano, Capital One & Eversheds
Cheese Matters – Real Life Financial Education
Subcategory: Education of Young People
Award won: Education of Young People subcategory
Overview
Cheese Matters has taken the important (but superficially unexciting) subject of financial education and transformed it into a creative and interactive workshop for young people, delivered by business volunteers. The 2hr session is based around a real-life scenario of personal bankruptcy which follows the story of Johnny Caerphilly. The course content encompasses; why people borrow money, how to budget, looking at the terms and conditions of a product, credit reports and the consequences of over indebtedness. By bringing the content to life, our message of personal financial responsibility is delivered and re-affirmed in a fun and engaging way.
Impact
Nottingham ranks as the 20th most deprived Local Authority area in England, with 70% of children living in workless or low-income households. Thanks to Cheese Matters, in the last 12 months 1,500 young people have benefited from high quality personal finance workshops, resulting in them being better equipped to deal with financial matters in adulthood.
Furthermore, 120 business volunteers have developed key skills and increased their confidence through the delivery of workshops. The programme has cemented a strong working relationship across the partner businesses and the engagement of other organisations means that more workshops can be delivered, extending our impact beyond Nottingham City.
Innovation
Although many financial education resources exist, each ‘provider’ works in its own silo.
We turned this on its head and combined the collective skills, knowledge and manpower of three Nottinghamshire companies – exponentially increasing our reach and impact on the local community.
Having worked with local schools, children and volunteers to create a pilot scheme, our approach of constant evaluation and adaption has created a scheme that is as effective as it is fun.
Cheese Matters is the first financial education workshop that utilises role play, video and interactive elements delivered by business volunteers, bringing essential skills to life.[/one_half_last]
Insight
Our ambition for the impact and scope of the programme at day one was big, with hindsight too big. We envisaged a programme that would cover all areas of financial education and reach all the young people in the City.
Experience quickly taught us that we needed simple, deliverable messages and that we must target delivery to the age group where it would be most efficacious. Interestingly, the process of modification from the initial pipe-dream to the current reality has been invaluable in creating a clear, robust, effective and deliverable scheme, with the flexibility to roll out further afield
Inspiration
In simple terms, this is already happening – organisations outside of the founding partnership have already been inspired to get involved.
The low-cost, interactive nature of the programme has captured business imaginations and can fulfil the needs of any organisation that wishes to take an active and worthwhile part in their community and support future generations. The programme was designed to make sure any organisation or individual, regardless of experience or expertise could run with it and deliver it successfully. It’s the complete package – all you need to do is find the school, the volunteers and set the date![/one_half_last]