On Board Online • February 23, 2026

By Sara Foss
Special Correspondent

When Annie Leeds was in high school, she founded her own nonprofit, the Annie Leeds Adventure Foundation, in honor of a close friend who died of cancer.

Now a senior at Villa Maria College in Buffalo, Leeds continues to manage her organization, which gives children with a chronic medical condition a day of fun, while majoring in business administration and pre-law. She's helped in this by her family and the personal finance courses she took in high school.

Those personal finance courses "gave me a lot of background knowledge," said Leeds, 21. "You can take it in so many different directions."

Under a measure introduced at November's Board of Regents meeting, personal finance instruction - often referred to as financial literacy - would be phased in over the next few years. If approved by the Regents (expected in March), financial education will be required for grades 5-12 starting in the 2026-27 school year and for grades K-4 in the 2027-28 school year.

NYSSBA supports a financial literacy requirement as long as state Legislature funds implementation. A resolution approved by delegates at NYSSBA's 2025 Annual Business Meeting reads: "NYSSBA shall support legislative or regulatory changes to add financial literacy into the statewide K-12 curriculum, with additional state funding to support implementation of this new curricular expectation."

The State Education Department (SED) has identified key topics to be covered, such as budgeting and money management, credit and debt management and savings and investment. But school districts would have a lot of leeway to design their financial literacy programs. For instance, the proposed regulatory amendment would allow districts to provide instruction in three ways: (1) as embedded instruction in existing subject areas, (2) as part of career and technical education programming, or (3) as stand-alone courses.

Standalone courses in personal finance

Akron Central School District in western New York has pioneered the stand-alone course approach. Akron High School - Leeds' alma mater - began requiring students to take a 20-week personal finance course - Personal Finance One - in 2020. It covers budgeting, banking, taxes, credit, insurance and retirement planning.

A newer course, Personal Finance Two, expands upon these topics, giving students a deep dive into investing versus saving, stocks, bonds, managing risk, funds, investing for retirement and more.

Karen Saeli, who teaches both classes, said her courses also cover newer investing topics, such as sports betting and cryptocurrency. Her students tend to be excited about crypto at the beginning of the unit. By the end, they're much more aware of the risks and less enthused, she said.

Financial literacy "is something I've been really passionate about my entire career," Saeli said. "So many people can't afford a $400 repair. Savings rates are so low. I see pensions going away. It's more on the individual for retirement. People need to be informed so they can take care of themselves and their families."

Graduates praise Akron for offering personal finance. Tiffany Judge, now a senior at SUNY Brockport, is majoring in marketing and international business with a minor in economics. She said her high school financial literacy courses gave her good preparation academically and have helped her navigate her path to becoming an independent adult.

"They helped me make smarter decisions around taking out loans," Judge, 21, said.

NY Inspires includes financial education

In July, the Board of Regents completed phase one of NY Inspires by adopting its new Portrait of a Graduate, a vision of what New York students should know and be able to do upon graduation.

The financial literacy requirement is included in phase two of NY Inspires, which emphasizes redefining credits and expanding learning experiences. Education Commissioner Betty Rosa described the financial literacy requirements as "an important step toward realizing our Portrait of a Graduate."

The personal finance instruction requirement has the backing of the Office of the New York State Comptroller. Staff appeared at November's meeting to express support.

"This is a very good step forward," said Maria Smith, director of financial literacy and education outreach for the Comptroller's Office. She said there are a lot of free resources available to help districts provide financial literacy instruction in their schools, such as the Next Gen Personal Finance curriculum. She said the comptroller believes that New York schools should be able to implement the new requirement in an "economical way."

Many New York students are already studying personal finance. According to SED, 215,062 students in 602 public school districts were enrolled in such classes during the 2024-25 school year. Examples of courses with personal finance instruction include classes in mathematics, introductory business, family and consumer science and banking and finance.

Akron's personal finance courses are part of the high school's business program, which also includes an accounting class, introduction to business and Tigers Innovations, a course in which students run a manufacturing company, producing school merchandise such as shirts and hoodies.

Marissa Brege, 17, a senior at Akron High School who plans to study sports management at York College of Pennsylvania, said Akron's business courses are her favorite classes. In these classes, she has developed business plans, helping her "lay out a path for what I might want to do," she said, adding that she hopes to open her own sports facility one day.

Akron's financial literacy courses are important because not every student learns about personal finance from their family, said Ava Lombard, 17, a senior who plans to study biomedical sciences at the University of Buffalo.

"The courses aided my personal life," Lombard said. "Personal finance is called personal finance for a reason - it's going to look different for everybody. It made me feel a lot more confident when discussing financial matters."