Realised this year how much my 19 year old just doesn't know

[davidssdt]

Bit of a random one. My eldest is 19 and it's only this year I've properly clocked how much genuinely useful "adult life" stuff just never gets covered in school - not because teachers don't try, but probably more that there's never actually time carved out for it.
I had to sit down and explain what a mortgage actually is and why an unpaid phone bill can damage your credit file for years, because none of that had ever come up in school. Also had the apprenticeship vs uni conversation recently and realised there's no real structured way for them to weigh that up - it's basically left to them and whoever they last spoke to.
So for full disclosure, I'm actually building something around this (a curriculum site for 16-25s) but not naming it here as I don't want this to read as a plug. I'm genuinely just curious what other parents experience has been around this. What's the thing your teenager had absolutely no clue about until they had to learn the hard way?

The importance of compound interest!

It’s not how many times you fail, it’s how often you can pick yourself up.
Resilience.

It isn't the education systems job to bring up your child.

I wondered that.

These are things you just pick up as you go along, at home, at work or when you need to know.

I am 76 and am pretty sure I never knew anything about all that as a teenager, and not much in my early twenties. When I was 24 and getting engaged to be married, we started to look for an affordable house to buy and I learned something about mortgages then, and insurance, before that I'd only rented and didn't care.

I teach in high school and we teach S2 and S3 budgeting, bank accounts, interest rates, wages, take home pay etc… however I know for a fact I mention the following year these topics and they deny ever learning them😂 kids are mostly goldfish!

I agree. I certainly wasn't taught any of that stuff in school but I knew about it all by the time I was 19.

I lost a couple of thousand pounds when younger in overpaid PAYE because I didn't know that you will be overcharged income tax on your second/third/etc job and it will not be automatically corrected later in the tax year. There's a six year time limit for writing to HMRC to claim overpayments back. I claimed eight years after starting a second job...

That second job PAYE swindle is something that teenagers need to know about. The further down the socioeconomic ladder they are, the more they need to know this because the more likely they are to be in several part-time jobs at once instead of one full-time job.

1. Where does "education" end and "bringing up" begin? I would argue that "sitting still" is a "bringing up" matter, but financial literacy is in scope for maths and home economics classes.
2. If a measure saves the country money in terms of avoiding negative outcomes, then the State (in this thread, via schools) should do it, regardless of whose job you think it "should" be. Traditionally, contraception was a "bringing up" matter. It's now taught in schools because having rampant STIs and unwanted pregnancies everywhere costs the country far more than teaching sex ed does.

1. If a measure saves the country money in terms of avoiding negative outcomes, then the State (in this thread, via schools) should do it, regardless of whose job you think it "should" be. Traditionally, contraception was a "bringing up" matter. It's now taught in schools because having rampant STIs and unwanted pregnancies everywhere costs the country far more than teaching sex ed does.

That's because teens' desire for a relationship and therefore the likelihood of sex is pretty high up on their agenda and needs addressing.

Money, not so much.

I like the idea of a site with this sort of content. Though share the common attitude that framing it as stuff that school didn't teach is really off putting and counter to the responsibility for self that is foundational to a well lead life.

A couple of things that never/rarely seem to get mentioned - how to look after your mental health (not, how to cope once you realise you're depressed/anxious/addicted to something/etc. but what you need to do to minimize the chances of mental health difficulties). Boys'/men's safety. We see lots of things emphasising women's safety, but a lot of it is based on fear that doesn't match risk and no one seems to do it for men. But men are more likely to be attacked and murdered than women and it's most likely going to be by another man they know - so why aren't we emphasising this danger and talking about red flags they can spot in friends and acquaintances?

I think a decent section about types of career, investment needed (e.g. qualifications and hours over a 40hr week, and capital for professions where that's common), drop out rates and realistic salaries after 1/5/10/20 years would also be good. I think a lot of kids, especially girls, can be really blind to the long term consequences of career choices.

Bills
wifi/tv plans etc
council tax
talking on the phone
budgeting

So how are you going to get young people off Chatgpt, Tiktok and Instagram and onto your website?

How are you going to get them to read your good quality accurate content over slick videos of nonsense by attractive influencer/content creators that young people admire? How will you get them to trust your site instead of the persuasive videos of alternative facts?

How are you going to fund the site?

How are you going to reach the people who need this stuff and actually get them to engage given that we already have near universal smart phone ownership yet there's lots of people who don't use the resource to educate themselves but for various non constructive or outright harmful reasons?

It just seems like an enormous undertaking to do properly and keep up to date when all the information is out there already and can be found by Googling.

You could, instead of writing your own content research where the best places to look in each category are and link to their content, eg MSE for money and a lot of consumer issues, because it is in fact quite broad, because being knowledgeable about life in general often saves you money eg, knowing your rights when renting, doing your own repairs rather than paying someone or replacing an item, meal planning, batch cooking and using up leftovers instead of regularly using Deliveroo etc.

I get your idea, and I don't think it's a bad one at all, but how will you make money from the site? Sorry if you've answered already. I don't think there is a gap in this market with Google, chatgpt, content creators ect at the minute.

As a career guidance professional, I think it’s important to point out that in Scotland, where I am, Skills Development Scotland do exactly what you are talking about regarding different post school routes etc.
For full disclosure, I do work for them, but the careers input into both primary and secondary schools is way more than a 5 minute chat.
There is also a full programme of teacher and parent education. Really important on your website to be cognisant of the difference in education systems between England and Scotland too, or you’ll be giving young people and parents totally wrong information.

https://www.myworldofwork.co.uk/

Given that your site is going to cover so many wide-ranging/diverse topics, how will you keep up to date and on top of constant changes in all the various areas? Legislation changes around tenancies, student loan changes, etc, etc.

You have had MSE mentioned and said that you will be covering a much wider range of subjects. That sounds time consuming and expensive to keep on top of it all.

(Also, I have had a quick look at your website and you are asking for email addresses but there is no disclosure about what that information will or will not be used for - eg marketing or whether it will be sold to third parties, etc. There is also no mention about cookies, etc. You may want to address things like that but it also brings to made that one of the things you should cover is phishing scams and data security, and so on)

Sexual health is a lifelong concern. So is money.

It needs to be both, because some kids have parents who are unwell / refugees / alcoholics or whatever and they either dont know or dont do it.
I know thats extra work for teachers but the kids who dont get it are the ones who need it most.

Its common for 19 year olds to not know lots of things! It needs to be an ongoing learning for them, have the conversations, talk to them about the news items etc.

This!!

Yeah maybe parents should teach this but as someone who grew up in a "mildly" abusive household at 34 I still don't fully understand mortgages and have never used SOHCAHTOA once 🙄

I feel it should be taught in schools and supported by parents because you'd never have known I was abused it all looked so ordinary but I missed out on vital skills.

So does Citizens Advice Bureau

I think this is stuff parents should be teaching. Nice if school can too but they can’t do everything. It’s great you are now teaching her but don’t blame the school

I had to reteach DP SOHCAHTOA in his mid 50s when he started to need it for work, so never say never

And yes, I did say, I bet you thought you'd never need this when you were learning it at school 40 years ago.

Just because you never used the maths stuff, doesn't mean nobody did.

There's a real vibe on this thread that children should be taught financial and political information that is relevant to their parents' (or even grandparents') generation.

I don't think being taught about mortgages and pensions is necessarily any more helpful than being taught about renters rights or an ssISA for example. Particuarly in a country with a broken housing market and a current workforce that may never retire.

So much of the 'financial advice' market is really a 'how to have middle class values around money', which may or may not suit an individual. Its more than just an annoyance, it leaves a gaping gap for crypto and FIRE lunatics to fill up social media with their marketing.