Financial literacy at Banka Slovenije

At Banka Slovenije we have been organising financial literacy programmes for a number of years now, covering a very broad educational spectrum, with an emphasis on younger generations. The activities encompass education days at Banka Slovenije, which each year host around 900 children and young people, mostly of school age, the production of our own educational materials, the Generation €uro competition, which is primarily aimed at secondary school students, and numerous other activities to raise public awareness of our role and of economic and financial themes.

Banka Slovenije has been holding its Education Day events since 2017, aimed primarily at school and university students. Participants first learn about the functioning of the central bank and its role in the financial system, and can then choose any of the specific subjects that interest them (cash, payments, price stability, monetary policy, banking supervision, bank resolution, central credit register). The lecturers are Banka Slovenije experts, while the content is tailored to various levels of complexity, and is thus fit for the widest possible audience.

Participants also visit the Banka Slovenije counters, where they are shown how they work, and the Little Gallery, which in the last few years has featured work by young art students at the University of Ljubljana. In this way they get to know other aspects of the central bank’s work, in support of arts and culture.

The Education Day events have hosted approximately 900 people each year. The coronavirus epidemic meant that attendance was down at last year’s event: after moving online, it had about 500 participants.

We have developed our own materials as part of the Education Day event: educational games for young and old, and worksheets with interesting exercises related to financial themes.

For the last 10 years, under the aegis of the ECB and together with 11 other euro area countries, we have been organising the Generation €uro competition, which is aimed at secondary school students. It is a three-stage competition, which can be entered by small groups of students with a mentor. After passing a quiz on economics, their task is to draw up analysis to predict future ECB monetary policy measures. The best teams then defend their analysis before a Banka Slovenije jury, and the winners are rewarded with a visit to the ECB in Frankfurt, to learn about its workings and to meet the current president. The competition each year is fierce and enthusiastic, and the analysis drawn up by the teams is of genuinely high quality.

Banka Slovenije’s financial literacy outreach also involves liaising with foreign and domestic institutions involved in financial education in their own fields.