Description of the programme

Less than a half of children and young people in the UK receive a meaningful financial education at home or in school. Along with parents and carers, teachers and practitioners have an important role to play in delivering financial education to children and young people.

Children and young people in vulnerable circumstances are at particular risk of poor financial capability and outcomes. There is limited financial education targeted to this audience and, while practitioners do not all have the confidence, knowledge and skills they need to teach children about money, there are also insufficient resources and training to support them.

In October 2022, the Money and Pension Service’s £1.1 million grant programme funded six organisations across seven projects covering all four nations of the UK. The funding was to develop and test approaches to supporting teachers and practitioners to deliver financial education to children and young people in vulnerable circumstances. The programme reached over 2,400 teachers, 1,000 practitioners and approximately 54,000 children and young people.

Vulnerable circumstances were defined as factors that are ‘linked to poorer financial capability and wellbeing’, increased exposure to the risk of financial detriment, and/or family circumstances requiring targeted or enhanced support.

The study

This report sets out findings of a mixed-methods approach to evaluating the programme led by Ecorys UK. The projects covered by the grant programme were divided into two Lots:

• teacher training (Lot 1)
• practitioner training (Lot 2).

For each Lot, an initial scoping phase was conducted to include a document review, consultations with MaPS staff and the development of a programme-level Theory of Change.

The main phase of data collection for both Lots involved qualitative and quantitative data collection across two waves of fieldwork in autumn/winter 2023 and spring 2024. Data were collected by Ecorys or the participating projects from a total of:

• 770 teacher, senior leaders or practitioner completed surveys
• 62 children and young people completed surveys
• 22 project delivery staff interviews or focus group participants
• 76 teacher, senior leader or practitioner interviews or focus groups participants
• 49 children and young people interviews orfocus groups participants
• 1 wider stakeholder interview (Lot 1 only)
• 7 project observation/visitation notes including reviewing resources (Lot 2 only)
• 2 reflective workshops with project delivery staff (Lot 2 only)
• quarterly management information from all projects.

Note that some participants were interviewed twice.

The key findings below synthesise results from the quantitative and qualitative elements of the evaluation.

Outcomes for teacher and practitioners

• Teachers’ and practitioners’ self-reported confidence, skills and knowledge in financial education improved after the received training.
• Teachers’ and practitioners’ motivation to teach financial education increased after the received training.
• Teachers and senior leaders observed that children and young people’s knowledge had increased as a result of financial education delivered by teachers who had received the training.

Outcomes for children and young people

• Children and young people self-reported having retained financial education knowledge and were more confident in their knowledge of money after receiving the financial education from trained teachers.
• Practitioners and some project delivery staff reported early signs of improved financial knowledge among children and young people after receiving the financial education from trained practitioners.
• Practitioners also expected to see improvements in children and young people’s confidence and knowledge about money following financial education delivered by trained practitioners.

Scalability and sustainability

• Helpful strategies for the sustainability of financial education within schools after training were:
  • flexibility of resources
  • cascading of training
  • the continued use of vocabulary and
  • recurring events related to financial topic.
• Positive factors for the scalability of onwards teacher training to other schools were:
  • the creation of networks and connections between schools
  • incorporation of financial education across various teaching subjects, and
  • offering the training free of charge.
• Strategies for embedding financial education effectively at the policy level were identified as:
  • including financial education in teacher training, and
  • recognising financial capability as a functional skill within the curriculum.
• Practitioners and project leaders were keen to continue delivery, but identified the need for further funding to so and the high turnover of practitioners as risks to this.

Methodological limitations

• The definition of vulnerable circumstances is circular, in so far as poorer financial capability and wellbeing are referred to by the authors both as elements of the definition and outcomes of vulnerable circumstances.
• The authors note that there were several challenges to data collection across the evaluation due to timescales, difficulties recruiting schools, response rates and potentially self-selection bias in the quantitative samples in particular. As a result, there was greater reliance than expected on qualitative findings in the report.
• Some quantitative findings are reported based on small sample sizes and statistical significance testing has not apparently been undertaken.
• While positive outcomes have been attributed to the programme, the evidence for this comes largely (though not exclusively) from self-report quantitative measures and qualitative insights, rather than observed quantitative differences.
• The full age range of the children and young people participating in the projects is not given, although the teacher-led projects specify both primary and secondary school settings.

Applicability

• This report offers policy makers, funders and service providers suggestions for how programmes and services can be shaped to support more teachers and practitioners working with children and young people in vulnerable circumstances to deliver financial education effectively.
• The report will also be of interest to researchers and evaluators who can play a role in filling gaps or strengthening the evidence base for effective financial education, and it offers learning to them about some of the challenges of undertaking research or evaluation in this field.

Relevance

• The study is relevant given the Money and Pensions Service’s commitment to the Financial Foundations national goal set out in its 2020-2030 UK Strategy for Financial Wellbeing.
• The report is relevant in a context in which the landscape of financial education provision is growing but in which children and young people in vulnerable circumstances are also at risk of poorer financial capability and wellbeing outcomes.

Generalisability/transferability

• Learning from this evaluation should generalise well to other countries with similar financial and socio-historical contexts and where there are strong commitments to the financial education of children and young people and similar structures for delivering it.