WHITEWATER, Wis. -- Governor Tony Evers signed a new law last week requiring Wisconsin high schoolers to study financial literacy as a graduation requirement.
Students at UW-Whitewater say that they were uninformed on topics like budgeting, investments, credit and loans upon their high school graduation.
"I think I could've been a lot more educated when it came to saving money where it can be saved," one student said.
The campus has a financial literacy center that offers group lessons and individual counseling sessions to students with finance questions.
"There's so much information to learn when a student first comes to college," said financial wellness coordinator Jamie Busse. "Things that are just not being talked about."
Angela Fitzgerald Ward at Madison Area Technical College says the lack of financial education specifically disadvantages already underprivileged students.
"The absence of that education assumes that everyone has, as a baseline, what they need to navigate that space successfully," she said. "And we know that's not the case."
Like on campus, the law had broad support in the legislature. It passed in the Senate with a 29-4 vote and a 95-1 vote in the Assembly. It will go into effect in the fall of 2024.
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