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?

Youre right it is- but I don’t know why.

To be honest we were taught some of that back in the 90s.

So you think that children are more likely to be engaged by a generic app teaching them about mortgages but won't listen to their parent explaining it to them?

Also your OP didn't say that you'd tried to teach your 19 yo about it and she didn't care. It was all omg I'm so surprised to suddenly learn she didn't pick all this stuff up at school, I "had to sit down" and explain it to her. But now you're saying that didn't actually work either and she didn't care?

surely you know roughly what’s in the curriculum and that these things aren’t covered??! I am shocked to be honest.
You also need to educate your child on the political system and why voting is so important… I suspect that parents who don’t teach their children much about this is one of the reasons why we’ve had 15 years of political decline!

I agree parents should be part of this - where I'd push back is that it's not really about willingness. There's a lot of ground to cover and it changes constantly (renting law had a full overhaul this year alone), so staying on top of all of it while working full time isn't realistic for most parents, me included in places.
Worth saying too that this has technically been part of the curriculum since 2014, folded into Citizenship. So it's less that schools ignore it, more that most teachers get little training on it and there's rarely dedicated time, so delivery ends up patchy. That's the actual gap I'm trying to fix, not a dig at parents or schools.

A lot of this is touched on in schools but there isn't time. Also, a lot of this won't really sink in until it's relevant or practiced which school can't provide.

Awesome. This is covered under the Entrepreneur pillar. One of the modules is titled "Sole Trader vs Limited Company: Choosing Your Setup". Thank you

Completely agree that's the actual skill. The concern isn't that she shouldn't be the one deciding, more that getting information from appropriate sources is genuinely harder than it sounds at 17/18. Most of what's out there is either a school pushing their own sixth form, random google pages that may be out of date or inaccurate or a career change influencer on TikTok generalising from one experience. There isn't really a neutral, structured way to just lay out how apprenticeships actually work, how degree funding actually works, and let him take it from there. That's the gap, not the deciding part.

How many parents have worked all the financial nitty gritty well enough to actually be able to teach their children though? You only have to look at the threads on here with people asking advice and the answers all ranging hugely, with posters arguing their way is best. I’d agree some help from the school from someone qualified would be helpful, as it is I talk to my 18yo about financial matters and I’ve heard, read and been told my way is for the dinosaurs and actually totally the wrong way to go (we were always taught about savings and now everyone talks about investing)

Are all things parents are supposed to teach...

Fair points. On parents vs school - I'm not trying to replace that, just that most of us are patching this together ourselves rather than working from anything structured.
On MSE and Meaningful Money - I know both and I rate both highly. Difference is scope: they're money-only, and I am covering renting, work, tax, decision-making, entrepreneurship, etc as one thing, plus things that have changed recently most resources haven't caught up on (renting law overhaul this year, for one).
On being "qualified" - I'm not the one writing the content, I'm building the structure and commissioning it properly. Thanks for your input.

2 minutes of googling will give you degree apprenticeship info

https://www.ucas.com/apprenticeships/degree-apprenticeships

https://educationhub.blog.gov.uk/2024/02/degree-apprenticeships-how-you-could-get-a-degree-for-free/

And how degree funding works...

https://www.gov.uk/student-finance

https://www.ucas.com/money-and-student-life/money/student-finance/student-finance-in-england

How is he unable to type "how does degree funding work" or "how do degree apprenticeships work" into Google??

True.
Although the vast majority of what is taught to teens in schools is just because it's on an exam curriculum and once the exam is done an awful lot is forgotten.
It's not "relevant or practiced" once the exam paper is done.
I was taught French for 5 years. I have a GCSE in French. Can I speak French beyond "Hello"?
No I can't 😂

Curriculum docs varies a lot by school, ours might just be light on it. The bigger pattern (Citizenship since 2014, patchy delivery) still holds even if one school's specifics differ. And giving primary age kids small age appropriate bits is great, but that's a different thing to a 19 year old actually needing to understand a mortgage application or pension auto-enrolment before they are in it.

@nomorelegoam aware. Doesn’t mean new generations don’t need to know too….

Well, maybe education like this may be just what the parent cannot provide and just what the kids need. Either way, I think it's a win win

It should be information available for everyone ie school-taught. If left to parents, the lucky ones get it, the unfortunate ones dont. And so the wealth and financial knowledge stays in family lines.

Was that comment for me?
What was it in reference too?
Edit: sorry....you meant the book "what they don't teach in school" (or whatever it's called).
I get what you mean. The current generation needs to learn those things too.
I just meant you get a lot of people say stuff like "they never taught us about mortgages in school" when it turns out they did. It's just forgotten.
Perhaps the book should be called "We did teach you this but you weren't listening properly" 😁

On the parenting dig, we've talked about mortgages, she just glazes over the way most teenagers do when a parent explains something rather than a random YouTuber they trust more.

Maybe they did try and teach her in school and she just “glazes over” there as well.

I mean, as a teacher, I can tell you lots of this is stuff I mention in class and actively teach in PSHCE lessons but for most of my students it’s in one ear and out of the other. It’s possible that is the case for your DC, but also I discuss these things with my own children so they know what a mortgage is because I discuss that we have one.

There is no time to teach everything to your children. They are at home far more than they are at school. Parents need to be parents and play a part in educating their children.

Google answers questions you already know to ask. Knowing what you don't know is the actual skill, not something you just pick up naturally. My daughter is very real, and no, she hasn't spontaneously researched mortgage rates for fun at 19, I'd be a bit worried if she had LOL

Nope. MSE does all of that too

You are not wrong. I initially posted it in the wrong section, being new to the site, but I have now paid MN and got them to copy over all the comments. Thanks for your input

Sigh.
But they don't all do this because they either don't know, don't care or don't understand.