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FinanceChallenge

 

Welcome to the New Jersey Personal Finance Challenge!

The Online Challenge will run from January 2nd to April 4th, 2025.

What is the National Personal Finance Challenge? 

The National Personal Finance Challenge is an opportunity for students to demonstrate their knowledge of personal finance by taking a 35 minute, 30 question exam on key topics in Personal Finance.

The New Jersey competition is fully online, free, and is open to all students regarldess of prior experience or coursework. There is a high school division for grades 9th-12th and a middle school division for grades 6th-8th.

The highest scoring team will become the state champion and represent New Jersey in the National Finals rounds. The National Finals round will consist of a case study scenario. For more information on the national competition, click here.

New for 2025! Prize money, per team. For first ($500), second ($350) and third ($200) place teams.

Steps to Register

  1. Teachers must first register to create their teacher profile. Returning teachers do not need to register again. 
  2. Once a teacher has registered, they sign up their teams of 3-4 students. Students cannot register themselves. Teachers can sign up for as many teams as they want.
  3. Overview ‘The Rules’ page for before you begin your test

Access Zone: A New Program for Title 1 Schools

To improve the competition experience and increase equity, the New Jersey Council is pleased to announce a special Access Zone for all New Jersey Title 1 schools. Funding for this program was made available to teachers and students through the generous support of the Voya Foundation and the Council for Economic Education.

Access Zone Benefits:

  • Get a shot at the prize money! For first ($500), second ($350) and third ($200) place teams.

 

  • The three Access Zone teachers who register the most students and complete all access zone requirements (see below) will receive a $100 Amazon gift card.

 

  • The highest-scoring team in the Access Zone program, upon fulfilling all program responsibilities will receive an all-expense paid trip to the finals in Atlanta, Georgia on June 1st and 2nd. New Jersey will have two teams advance to Finals: the top overall team, and the top Access Zone team. At the National level, cash prizes for each member of the winning teams are: 1st Place $2,000, 2nd Place $1,000, 3rd Place $500, 4th Place $250

 

  • Teachers can sign their classes up for optional guest speaker opportunities starting in January. Sessions will begin in February. These sessions are led by a Voya Investment Management employee, through Zoom.

 

Requirements for Access Zone schools:

  • Teachers register an account and sign up their students for the New Jersey Personal Finance Challenge. There is no limit to the number of teams you can sign up for, so register all your classes! 

 

 

  • Teachers must administer the student pre-survey to their classes as early into Personal Finance instruction as possible! Please have the students complete this as early as you can!

    • For Question #1: If your students have a Student ID associated with their name at school, they should input that number. Student IDs must match on the pre and post survey, so having students come up with their own IDs to remember is not advised.

    • Teachers take 35 minutes of their classroom to administer the competition's assessment. Students who were registered but do not compelte the competition cannot be counted.

 

  • Teachers must administer the student post-survey to their classes after competing in the competition, no later than April 21st.  

 

Please contact dtan@councilforeconed.org  if you have questions or need assistance.