Money lessons proving a lifeline for students with special needs

Personal finances are slowly making their way into the national curriculum of our schools – but this is cold comfort to the many young people with special educational needs who are not getting the lessons needed to help them understand the most important money matters.

Here we visit a building association that is starting an initiative to rectify this injustice.

Why support is needed?

Youth with special educational needs don’t need our pity, just our support. There are up to a million students between the ages of 16 and 18 who are hindered in their learning by conditions such as autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Down syndrome.

While some struggle to live independently, all could live more independent lives if they were given the tools to deal with personal financial challenges, such as running a bank account.

Unfortunately, financial services do not offer a standard package of tailor-made support for such young people. Even educational charities that put personal finance into the school curriculum don’t offer special classes.

Myron Jobson, personal finance education campaigner for asset manager Interactive Investor, says: “This vulnerable group of young people needs our help more than any other in society, yet strangely enough they are forgotten and ignored by almost everyone. It’s time to deal with this shameful situation.”

How Industries Can Help

A dozen students between the ages of 16 and 18 came to visit the Nationwide Building Society in Basildon, Essex. They are from the Endeavor Co-operative Academy – a special education school – in nearby Brentwood.

Senior branch manager Zafar Sadak invited them after he was inspired by his special needs teacher wife Maz, who shared with him her concern that such youth often fall through the cracks in society without the support they need and deserve.

Branch workers take a hands-on approach by showing these students how to master internet banking, use a branch counter, operate an ATM, and are told about the need to be aware of bank scammers. Nationwide offers “money lessons” programs for all schools. But it is not aimed at people with special needs, so the program had to be tailor-made for the academy students.

Metro Bank offers ‘money zone’ classes to ‘care leavers’ – young adults who have spent time in care, such as in a children’s home.

Regular personal finance classes are not compulsory in primary education. High schools usually treat banking as part of personal, social, health, and economic classes. The Young Enterprise financial education charity provides educational assistance to schools across the country through the Young Money program.

But it doesn’t provide standard, tailor-made lessons for those with special needs — just guidelines on how lessons can be customized. Sharon Davies, chief executive of Young Enterprise, said: “Certainly more can be done to support people with special educational needs. The most important thing is to offer them practical help, for example support from a bank to manage their money.’

The charity offers team programs where children with special educational needs can work together and develop money skills. Jobson of Interactive Investor says, “We need action now to ensure that personal finance lessons are accessible to everyone.”

The cost of failure

People with learning disabilities are often targeted by scammers who want to exploit their trusting nature. Many vulnerable young people are the target of ‘money mules’ – friends with criminals who use them to launder money.

Sadak of Nationwide says, “A particularly heartless ruse is for people to pretend to be a young person’s friend and abuse their trusting nature. They then politely ask if they can send some money, because they have trouble using their bank account.’

He adds: ‘They could give the younger £1,000 and ask them to put it into their account and tell them to keep £100 as a thank you for helping.’ Money laundering – even if done unknowingly – is a serious crime that can lead to a bank account being frozen.

A discussion of fraud involving employees at Nationwide’s Basildon facility leads many to share their experiences of criminals trying to steal from them and their families. Brandon Love, 18, says: ‘Like many of my friends, I’m bombarded with calls and texts from people trying to sell me something or give me money they say I owe.

“They ask for my bank details. The only way I can deal with it is to ignore the message.’