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Helping people make better financial decisions: The role of online personal finance learning
Professor Sharon Collard The True Potential Centre for the Public Understanding of Finance
SUI Credit Union workshop: Delivering on Membership Value
University of Strathclyde, 26 June 2015@PUFin_Sharon #PUFin @OUBSchool
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My agenda
• Personal Finance Modules• Managing My Money• Managing My Investments• Q&A
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Personal finance modules
• Three online modules for adults, free of charge– Managing My Money (2014)– Managing My Investments (2015) – Consumer rights and responsibilities (2016)
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Personal finance modules
• Available on two platforms:– FutureLearn: Massive Open Online Course,
facilitated by OU educators– The Open University’s OpenLearn: permanent
resource, not facilitated
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• Personal Finance Modules• Managing My Money (MMM)• Managing My Investments• Q&A
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Purpose of MMM• Improve personal finance knowledge and understanding
– Financial planning, household balance sheet, spending and borrowing, mortgages, pensions and savings, insurance
• Understand social and behavioural drivers of financial decisions (e.g. ‘bad financial habits’)
• Establish systematic ways to manage individual financial decisions and aggregate household finances
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Key Features of MMM
• Covers spectrum of personal finance subjects• 24 hours of study over 8 weeks• Divided into digestible ‘steps’• Targeted at people aged 16+• Text, AV assets, quizzes, discussions, self-
assessment tests
Managing My Money: FutureLearn
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MMM in numbers1st FL
presentation2nd FL
presentationTotal
Registered 15,390 19,465 34,855
Active Learners 10,000 11,071 21,071
Comments posted 24,794 29,792 54,586
Steps visited 493,144 435,613 928,757
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Getting people interested
• PR campaign in run-up to MMM1, May 2014– Featured on 166 radio stations, 26 press/online
pieces, 23 broadcast interviews • How found out about the course?
– FutureLearn website (43%), 21% read about it online, 15% read about it in print media
• Personal interest (98%), free course (49%)
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Who signed up?• More women (64%) than men (35%)• Aged 46+ (53%), only 9% under 25• Lived in UK (78%) • Educated to degree level or above (61%)• In work (67%) or retired (16%)• Familiar with online learning (55%)
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Learners’ views about MMM
• Overall experience excellent (53%) or good (39%)• Time required ‘about right’ (89%)• Course structure very (80%) or fairly (18%) clear• Activities interesting (73%), helpful (72%),
thought-provoking (49%), challenging (28%)
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Pensions are the ‘big worry’• How does the new pension regime work? • How do I take advantage of new pension freedoms?• How do I transfer to another pension scheme and
what are the costs? • How do I evaluate different pension products?• How do I check that my pension plans are on track
for the outcome I want?
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Impact of MMM?
• Know a lot (47%) or a little (47%) more about the subject now
• Activities ‘changed my view’ (17%)• Qualitative feedback from comments posted
on the steps
De-mystifying financial matters
Take steps towards managing a vastly reduced income
Signed up for online banking
Created financial spreadsheet and budget
Made changes that will save me money
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Take-aways
• Strong uptake and lots of interaction– Some people do want to talk about personal
finance• Can we engage younger people, people on
lower incomes, and those less well educated?• What more can we do to measure impact?
– ‘Design-in’ to courses, follow-up surveys
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• About True Potential PUFin• Personal Finance Modules• Managing My Money• Managing My Investments• Q&A
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Managing My Investments• On FutureLearn from 11 May 2015• Six week course covers:
– Different investment choices, returns and risks, historical performance
– Investment strategies and the practicalities of investing– Behavioural traits and their impact on effective
investment decision making
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• Personal Finance Modules• Managing My Money• Managing My Investments• Q&A
Find out moreManaging My Moneywww.open.edu/openlearn/openlearn/ocw/money-management/managing-my-money/content-section-overview
www.futurelearn.com/courses/managing-my-money/
Managing My Money Q&A Socials – videos from Managing My Money 2nd FL presentation
www.open.edu/openlearn/moneyquestions
www.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/managing-my-money-the-experts-answer-your-questions
Managing My Investmentswww.futurelearn.com/courses/managing-my-investments
True Potential PUFinwww.open.ac.uk/pufin
OU personal financewww.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/money/personal-finance
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Sign up for updates
http://www3.open.ac.uk/forms/FBLPUFinCentre/
Follow us on Twitter@PUFin_Sharon @WillBrambley
#PUFin @OUBSchool
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