Introduction
The world is recovering from financial crisis which started in 2007. The cause of the crisis was failure of American Mortgage Company. The effect has spread all over the world; however the world seems to be recovering.
This is not the first time that the world has suffered such a crisis. There was the great depression of 1980s. The point that is in people’s mind; economists, politicians, and social scientist is how they can prevent the occurrence of such a crisis in future. Among the many recommendation brought out, there is the role that education can play.
Our education system can be moulded to train student and the society in general on how they can prevent such an occurrence in the future. Secondary school life is the initial stage that a child moulding can start. It ensures that there is a base of a human being which can be shaped to influence the life of the child in future (Alloy & Ahrens, 2008). This paper will focus on how education can be used to combat future occurrence of such crisis.
Development and enforcement of a money management principles
The principle that human beings have are moulded by early life development. At high school a child is given some money to manage and spend. This is the period that they are given pocket money to spend at school and are allowed to make individual decisions towards things that affect their lives.
In schools children should be taught on how to manage the finances they have, they should be trained on how to make decisions which have an impact on the finances they have. The little money they are given by their parents should be the one to start molding their behavior towards good financial management and making priorities. One of the most important things that people should aim at is to have a house for their own.
However, the way they acquire these properties should be interpolated. This stage is shaping the life of young adults. The principles that the young adult develops are likely to effect the spending that he will adopt in the future. Spending is a behavior which can be controlled through molding process.
One personality determines the behavior of an individual and thus when developing personality attributes that support good financial decisions should be instilled in the young adults. The behavior, the attitude and the mode of operation, the character, and the values that the person holds are all defined by ones personality (Ambachtshee, Beartty & Booth, 2008). A personality is developed from an individual’s internal and external surroundings. It is the one that distinguishes an individual among others.
Behavior Modification
Early childhood exposure has a large influence on somebody’s behavior. If a child has been born from a family of spendthrifts he is likely to be so in his later life. Approaching the behavior at high school level can assist in changing the instilled behavior (Park, cona, & Fingess, 2008).
It is appreciated that human beings develop a certain mode of behavior from factors arising from socialization right from childhood and these follow him to adulthood. Our values, beliefs, and morals are largely influenced by the society we live in, culture, and hereditary factors.
Societies have different mechanisms that are geared towards re-enforcing certain behavior deemed acceptable. However, as human beings interact with each other, change their lifestyle, or are compelled to change their mode of belief whether consciously or not, a behavior modification, which in most cases conflicts with previously instilled values, occurs.
The modification may be conscious. For example, when an individual enrolls in an institution with set rules and guidelines, they are unconditionally required to follow those rules. Similarly, in society, there are laws that are required to be followed, without question and institutions are set up to ensure that these laws are followed and that their dis-obedience is punished.
An example of this applies in military training camps where recruits are not given options other than strict adherence to the rules-whether or not they conflict with their personal beliefs. Right from the first day, a policy of ‘break’ (this means that the training is meant to disconnect the trainee from their norms) then ‘mould’ (this means the training is geared to instill some way of life that will henceforth be perceived as appropriate according to the job they are training to perform) finally hardening or reinforcing the developed way of life.
Initially, the individual takes the behavior as an artificial or short term modification only to realize later that the behavior has become part of them and always conflicts with their own behavior. This may be illustrated by the recurrent tribal clashes especially in Africa and racial disputes the world over (Morris, 1997).
Dealing with peer pressure
At high school age, the child is at adolescence stage. He is likely to be influenced by peer pressure. To avoid and curb the influence, high school curriculum should be moulded to ensure that a child develop principles which he can stand the influence of his peers.
This is the role of lessons like leadership development, financial management, and psychology. These are units which should be included in a schools high school curriculum.
Competitions should be made on how well the young adults should be spending their monies. They can be given money of which they are tested on how they utilize their funds. Investing clubs should be implemented at these early ages where the students are guided on how to go along making investment decisions.
This will be in courses like entrepreneurship and business. One factor that global financial crisis and great depression share is that both of them emerged after there was a failure in international trade. In most cases this has happened due to countries having bad relations. Tribalism, racism, and discrimination should be avoided at this early stage (Melzert, 1995).
Conclusion
Future occurrence of financial crisis can be avoided if the approach and the start is from high school. Young adults should be trained on financial management and curriculum developed which instil financial discipline in an individual.
Parents, care givers, and kindergarten teachers have the first responsibility to ensure that the child develop financial discipline. At high school and secondary school good financial management behaviours should be reinforced while bad ones should be modified. By so doing the world can be assured of a future without financial crisis.
Reference List
Alloy, L., & Ahrens, A. (2008). Depression and pessimism for the future: Biased use of statistically relevant information in predictions for self versus others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52(2), 366-378. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.52.2.366
Ambachtshee, K., Beartty, D. and Booth, L. (2008). The financial crisis and rescue. What went wrong? Why? What lesson can be learnt? Toronto: university of Toronto
Melzert, H. (1995). Review of “Curriculum-adjustment in the Secondary School”. Journal of Educational Psychology, 16(9), 638. doi:10.1037/h0068007.
Morris, P. (1997). School knowledge, the state and the market: an analysis of the Hong Kong secondary school curriculum. Journal of Curriculum Studies, 29(3), 329-350. doi:10.1080/002202797184071.
Park ,R. cona, K. and Fingess, M. (2008). The crisis of global environment governance: towards a new political economy of sustainability. New York: Prentice Hall