KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Full Name: Prof. Dr. Julie Heath
Designation: Director of the Economics Center
University: University of Cincinnati, United States
Dr Julie Heath is an accomplished educator (Professor of the Year awards abound), researcher and passionate advocate for economic and financial education. She was named a Visiting Research Fellow at Princeton University to conduct research in the area, and was tapped by the President’s Council on Financial Capability to lead a national project to integrate financial literacy into math. She served on the Committee on Economics for the National Assessment of Educational Progress, and was named a “Money Hero” by Money Magazine. A recognized leader in economic and financial education in the United States, Julie has been at the vanguard of bringing financial education to elementary school students throughout the U.S.
Keynote: Reframing Financial Literacy
Financial literacy should and must start in the elementary grades. If financial education is seen as imparting critical thinking skills that students apply to all facets of their lives, then establishing that foundation early allows it to be treated like other academic disciplines, with layers of understanding applied to fundamentals. It also makes philosophical and pedagogical sense that economic and financial education be integrated into other academic disciplines. Dr. Julie Heath will address the need to reframe the basic definition of economic and financial literacy, and discuss how this new conceptualization paradoxically leads to challenges for researchers
Full Name: Prof. Dr. Carmela Aprea
Designation: Chair for Economic Education, Faculty of Business and Economics
University: Friedrich Schiller University, Germany
Dr Carmela Aprea is Full Professor of Business and Economics Education at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany. She is a nominated member of the OECD International Network on Financial Education Research Committee. She holds a Diploma Degree from the Goethe University Frankfurt (Germany) and a PhD from the University of Mannheim (Germany). Carmela Aprea worked and did research in various colleges in Europe (e.g., Switzerland, Austria, Italy and The Netherlands). She works with Bank of Italy, and European Banking Association. Her main research interests include financial literacy assessment and education, curriculum and learning research as well as teacher education and professional development in the domain of business and economics. Current research projects are focused on models of instructional design in financial education, situated and adaptive assessment of financial competence, development and implementation of serious games in financial education and video-based financial education
Keynote: Designing effective financial literacy education: What is the problem? What do we know? What can we do?
The ability to make sound financial decisions is becoming increasingly essential in most people’s everyday life. In addition, financial issues are highly relevant for economic and citizenship education. Given the complexity of financial world, family socialization and informal learning might be insufficient for attaining these ambitious educational aims but more systematic and institutionalized learning processes seem to be required. However, results from current meta-analyses indicate effects of available financial education programs though rather limited, will shed some light on the question of why this might be the case. This keynote will examine alternative methods for designing effective financial education might look like, based on insights from a recent research project which was focused on the development, testing and evaluation of exemplary learning arrangements to promote financial literacy among VET students in Switzerland. This project adopted a holistic approach to financial education, involving not only knowledge and cognitive skills to deal with money and financial issues but also emotional and motivational aspects as well as attitudes and values. It was built on a design-based research methodology, including project-related collaboration with all relevant stakeholders.
Full Name: Prof. Dr. Eveline Wuttke
Designation: Chair of Economic and Business Education
University: Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany
Eveline Wuttke is Professor of Economic and Business Education at Goethe University in Frankfurt. She holds a degree in Economic and Business Education and English from the University of Mannheim, a PhD from the University of Gießen and a Habilitation degree in Economic and Business Education from the University of Mainz.
Her research activities are in the area of learning from errors at school and at work, professional development of business and economics teachers, domain specific competence measurement in vocational education and economic competence/financial literacy.
She has a leading role in recent research projects funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and research.
Eveline Wuttke has been a member of various national and international scientific communities for many year. She joined the European Association for Research on Learning and Instruction (EARLI) in 1993 and the American Educational Research Association (AERA) in 2000.
Furthermore she is a reviewer for various scientific journals and conference papers.
Keynote: A Situational Judgment Approach to Measure Financial Literacy of Young Adults
Financial literacy is of particular importance due to recent developments, e.g. the past economic and financial crisis as well as the recent debt crisis of many European countries. On an individual level, private over-indebtedness stresses the importance of the topic. In modern economies, the ability to deal with financial matters is becoming increasingly important—not just for professionals in the sector of investment and banking, but for every individual, responsible for managing his or her financial affairs in everyday life. This ability is instrumental in decision making as political, social and economic changes demand better financial literacy.
To successfully implement financial education in schools, qualitatively good data are necessary to decide about the status quo of financial literacy of young adults. However, there is a deficit in high quality instruments and measurement approaches. This keynote addresses the issues in this gap with an instrument that reliably collects data about financial literacy in adolescents and young adults and to gain knowledge that helps to implement financial education in the school context and successfully teach it to young people.
Full Name: Prof. Dr. John Brock
Designation: Director of the Center for Economic Education
University: University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, United States
JOHN BROCK, Ph.D. is Director of the Center for Economic Education at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs and a Vice President of J.V. Bruni and Company, an investment adviser firm. He holds a doctorate in economics from Cornell University and an MBA from the University of Southern California. John has 36 years’ experience teaching economics at the University of Colorado and the United States Air Force Academy, receiving the AFA’s Outstanding Educator Award in 1984 and UCCS’s Outstanding Teacher of the Year Award in 2002. As Director of the Center, John creates and teaches classes and seminars for K-12 social studies teachers throughout Colorado. Since 1998, John has been teaching university economists and secondary-level teachers in countries of the former Soviet Union, Egypt, Jordan, South Africa, Paraguay, Peru, Mexico, Uruguay and Indonesia as part of the Council for Economic Education’s international program and more recently in affiliation with the Global Economic Education Alliance, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization for which John is the President and co-founder.
Keynote: Economic Principles Framework for Financial Decision Making
Since the financial crisis of 2008 – 09 organizations around the globe have initiated programs of all shapes and sizes in an attempt to improve the financial literacy of each associated constituency. Most education systems require students to take multiple courses in history, mathematics, literature, and other disciplines, except financial literacy. Realizing this serious mistake, financial literacy education is now brought to the fore and many countries are striving to find ways to not only improve personal finance knowledge, but educational approaches that might lead to behavioural changes following the newfound learning of the students (and adults) participating in financial literacy programs. This presentation will focus on the use of activity-based personal finance instruction, with key economic principles providing the underlying framework for decision-making.