Population Council Research that makes a difference

A mentor in UCEP's Mirpur Technical School, Dhaka, discusses a planning exercise with a UCEP student. Photo: Laila Rahman/Population Council

A classroom teacher in BRAC’s Kishori Club in Chandoshi, Tangail, describes microfinance loans available in the area. The class she is addressing was part of the intervention to promote financial education. Photo: Sigma Ainul/Population Council

The global financial crisis—and the development of diverse financial instruments—has brought into focus the need to develop context- and culturally relevant financial literacy programs. Recognizing that enhanced financial capabilities may be important for the empowerment of young people, especially the poor, and may even have implications for their healthy transitions to adulthood, the Population Council in Dhaka undertook a pilot intervention research project. The project offered financial education in conjunction with livelihood skills and life-skills programs and sought to measure short-term impact on a range of capabilities and life-skills indicators. The project contrasted two styles of teaching: a traditional classroom method and one in which students were mentored in small groups.

The educational intervention was conducted in collaboration with two highly successful Bangladeshi institutions, BRAC and the Underprivileged Children’s Education Program (UCEP) between April and July 2010. A baseline survey preceded the intervention, and an endline survey followed the implementation of the 20-hour curriculum. A qualitative study was conducted to inform the intervention and survey design. The three-arm study included a control and two intervention groups. The 620 respondents were girls 15–19 years old. The survey used netbooks and a paperless survey instrument.

The project was able to design a cost-effective curriculum with implementation guidelines and established the feasibility and acceptability of teaching personal finance through mentoring as well as more traditional methods. The next step of the program will be to introduce the curriculum to a more diverse group and to test it on a large enough scale that statistically significant impact may be detected.