Thank you for participating in the Personal Financial Literacy Challenge for 2012-13 and taking the time and initiative to step up to the challenge. Congratulations to all of the teams that are advancing to the State Finals on April 5, 2013. The competition had five regions participate.  Results were tallied by both fall and spring competitions. Below is the list of qualifiers in order of the qualifying teacher’s last name.

2013_PFL_Results

For registration or more information visit http://www.financechallenge.org/

To the Texas Personal Financial Literacy Challenge ONLINE!

The Challenge is about to begin:

• January 1, 2013- Spring Challenge Teacher Registration Begins – Come to http://www.financechallenge.org/ and register.
• March 4 – March 22, 2013- Spring Online Competition – Teams login and face the Challenge! Top 2 high school teams based on the online challenge test results for the Fall 2012 and the Spring 2013 school year with the scores from both semesters being compared for each region per division will be invited to the State Finals!
• April 5, 2013 – State Finals- Will be held at The Bullock Texas State Museum. The museum is located at 1800 N. Congress Avenue in Austin, TX 78701. The state champion team will go on to compete for the national title.
• May 2, 2013 – National Personal Finance Challenge – Wells Fargo Advisors Headquarters in St. Louis, MO.

As part of the Smarter Texas program, TCEE and Opportunity Texas sponsored the first annual (PFL) Personal Financial Literacy Challenge during the spring 2011 school year.   Students working in teams of four completed the online test at their campuses. The online Finance/PFL Challenge test is sponsored by the national Council for Economic Education and the Nebraska Council on Economic Education.  TCEE is pleased to announce that 661 students competing in 177 teams participated in the first PFL Challenge. Twenty teams were invited to the Texas state competition which was held in Houston on April 12, 2011.  Seventeen of the teams were able to participate.  The students individually took the first PFL Challenge test, and after the volunteers from Bank of America, Citibank, Texas Society of Certified Public Accountants and Wells Fargo graded the tests, the scores were averaged for the ranking based on the first round of testing. The teams took the second test collaboratively.

From the results of the first two rounds of testing, Michael Clark had two of his Bellaire High School (Houston ISD) teams face off for the Quiz Bowl.  After both teams answered a series of questions, the Texas state PFL Champion is the Red Sox team.   They will be heading to St. Louis, Missouri for the regional and national competition on May 16, 2011.  TCEE will keep everyone posted with their results.

Congratulations are also in order to the second place Texas team, the Bellaire Eagles.

TCEE thanks all who participated on the campuses and in the state PFL Challenge “play-off.”  TCEE also acknowledges the hard work by Catherine Rinhart, TCEE Program Director, who coordinated the challenge and the two challenge judges, Susan Kizer, Houston Branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and Germaine Gray of Texas Southern University.

Teachers, schools and districts Invited to the TX Council on Economic Education PFL State Competition:

TCEE Thanks Its Partners

TCEE thanks its partners that financially supported the PFL Challenge:

• Citibank
• Council for Economic Education
• Nebraska Council on Economic Education
• Opportunity Texas
• Texas Society of Certified Public Accountants
• Union Pacific Railroad
• Wells Fargo Bank

TCEE appreciates its volunteers who helped with the event:

Bank of America:  Kimberly Jackson and Eden Villarreal

Citibank:  Stephanie Hail and Natalie Kassenyera

Texas Society of Certified Public Accountants:  Brenda Banks, Gail Neely, Brenda Banks, and Janet Scudder

Wells Fargo Bank:  Alan C Watkins

TCEE gratefully acknowledges the PFL judges:  Susan Kizer of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas-Houston Branch and Germaine Gray, Texas Southern University.

Personal Financial Literacy Challenge or Finance Challenge

Click here for the official Personal Financial Literacy Challenge, also known as the FinanceChallenge Webpage

Add competitive excitement to your classroom!

The Personal Financial Literacy Challenge, also known as the FinanceChallenge ONLINE! is designed to provide an online competition in Personal Finance for teachers and students throughout the nation. Research has shown that student clubs and competitions increase student participation, promote attendance, and help students achieve higher grades and standardized test scores.

For teachers, the Challenge provides a useful tool to help encourage students and generate excitement for classroom materials.

You can’t read the news without seeing why a fundamental understanding of economics and finance is so important to the future of our youth and our country.

Nobel Laureate in Economics James Tobin said, “High school graduates will be making economic choices all their lives, as breadwinners and consumers, and as citizens and voters. A wide range of people will bombard them with economic information and misinformation for their entire lives. They will need some capacity for critical judgment.”

The Vision of the Texas Council is a nation of citizens possessing the knowledge and skills to make informed economic decisions. The Personal Financial Literacy Challenge supports this mission by creating a fun incentive for students to take ownership of their education, their choices and their future.

For registration or more information visit http://www.financechallenge.org/

Spring 2011 Results

Thank you for participating in the Spring Personal Financial Literacy Challenge for 2010-11 and taking the time and initiative to step up to the challenge. Congratulations to all of the teams that are advancing to the State Finals. The spring was divisional round to determine the qualifiers for the state finals.  The Spring competition had two regions participate in the challenge with the majority from the Houston and Dallas regions. As a result, more teams from the Houston and Dallas regions will participate in the April 12, 2011 finals.  Attached is the list of qualifiers in order of the qualifying teacher’s last name.