TAKE CONTROL OF “YOUR FUTURE”JUSTIN SARRATT

CLEMSON UNIVERSITY: YOUTH DEVELOPMENT LEADERSHIP

IntroductionGraduating high school is becoming more crucial for life. Students need to understand why they are attending high school and what specifically lies ahead in life. High school students need programs in place that clearly give them the facts about the importance of education, graduation rates, unemployment rates, financial earnings based on educational attainment, and financial literacy.

Guiding Questions1. What is the level of educational aspirations and

financial literacy of high school students prior to participating in a focused intervention designed to improve these outcomes?

2. Will participating in the “Your Future” program improve students’ future educational aspirations after completing the program?

3. Will participating in the “Your Future” program increase students level of fiscal responsibility upon completing the program?

4. Will participating in the “Your Future” program increase educational aspirations and fiscal responsibility relative to a control group of students who did not participate in the program?

“Your Future”• 4 Year High School Program• One day event at the Beginning of each School

Year• Freshman: Why they attend high school and

creating a plan to graduate.• Sophomore: Higher Education Requirements

and Employment.• Junior: Financial Literacy.• Senior: Career Research and Applying to

Colleges.

Literature Review• Graduating high school is important considering

the U.S. economy today. The national unemployment rate has gone from 5 percent in December of 2007 to 9.1 percent in August 2011 according to the U.S. Department of Labor in 2012. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, high school dropouts have a greater chance of being unemployed during economic downturns.

• The results from the article “Usual Weekly Earnings of Wage and Salary Workers” by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed the correlation of the higher the educational attainment, the higher the weekly earnings of wage and salary workers.

• U.S. high school seniors are struggling to grasp financial literacy according to a recent survey. High school seniors on average answered 52.4% of a 30-question financial survey correctly. That was up from 52.3% when the survey was last conducted two years ago but down from 57% in 1997, the first year for the survey, according to the Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy.

• "Financial literacy is still a very significant problem. It doesn't seem to be getting any better," says Lewis Mandell, a professor at SUNY Buffalo School of Management.

Problem StatementMany high school students do not understand what awaits them after high school, the cost of living in this world, and how education can help them afford this price and succeed. This lack of knowledge and purpose in high school could be a factor in a 72% national graduation rate in 2008 (Alliance: The Nation’s High Schools, 2012). Graduation rates and employment rates need to be improved today in order to set students up for a life where they can afford to live and prosper in American society.Purpose StatementThe purpose of this study is to educate high school students of the responsibilities that await them in the working world, how to be fiscally responsible, and to understand how and why education will put them on them on the path to independence.

Methodology• Quantitative Research Design• Survey Research• Survey administered to 9th, 10th, 11th, and

12th grade students at Gaffney High School in Gaffney, SC

• Stratified Random sample because will include students of all academic levels within each grade (i.e. college prep, honors, advanced placement)

• Survey looks into high school students’ knowledge of goals, requirements for higher education and employment, and financial literacy.

• Survey will determine a need for the “Your Future” program.

Implications of Findings1. Will provide accurate findings of students’

knowledge of the topics under review.2. Will determine the need for the “Your

Future” program.3. Will determine exact information students

need to be taught to prepare them for the world after high school.