Empowering Austin’s Youth to Build Their True Financial Futures
April is National Credit Union Youth Month and Austin Telco Federal Credit Union is celebrating by helping our young members kick off their summer of savings! Every year, credit unions across the country celebrate National Credit Union Youth Month - a month dedicated to help the youth in our communities start building their true financial futures. With summer approaching, there’s no better time than now for teens and young children to start learning about financial literacy and put some of those skills to the test.
When to Start Your Children’s Financial Education
Most young adults start their first job around 15 or 16, but that doesn’t mean they have to wait until then to start learning how to save and manage their money. Starting financial education early is a great way to establish the importance of financial literacy and sets the foundation to responsible spending and saving.
Knowing how to save doesn’t always come naturally and it can often be difficult for youth to understand the true value of money without firsthand experience. National Credit Union Youth Month is a great opportunity to start having financial conversations with your kids to help teach them how to save and responsibly spend their money in the future. That way, when it’s time to start budgeting and even planning for college, they’ve already learned the basics and can continue building from there. For now, it’s okay to start small.
Teaching Teens vs Young Children Financial Literacy
Parents looking to start their kid’s financial education will likely have different approaches depending on their child’s age. With younger children, you want to focus more on establishing needs vs wants whereas, with teens, who are likely starting their first job, you may want to focus more on budgeting and other advanced financial concepts, like taxes and saving for big purchases or college.
Either way, a great strategy to start building a solid financial foundation during National Credit Union Youth Month is to incorporate lessons into their day-to-day. For example, you could turn something as standard as grocery shopping into a teachable moment. This could be as simple as explaining to your younger children why you’re choosing one product over another or allowing your teen to make the grocery list so they can better understand how their purchasing decisions affect their budget.
Austin Telco Welcomes Young Members
Austin Telco is always here to help you and your young ones start building a true financial future, and for National Credit Union Youth Month, we want to make it even easier for our young members to get started. Opening a Youth Savings Account is simple! The only items you will need to provide is your child’s birth certificate, SSN, and a $25 deposit to maintain their share of the credit union for as long as the account is open. A parent or guardian is required to be a joint owner of the account and will need to provide a valid government-issued ID and Social Security Number.
It’s never too early to start teaching your children financial literacy so why wait? Get started today at Austin Telco Federal Credit Union! Contact us for more information about opening a youth account for your child and how you can help celebrate National Credit Union Youth Month at Austin Telco!