Teen financial literacy program receives grant from Experian – National Consumers League

April 22, 2009

2009 state champion LifeSmarts teams en route to St. Louis for annual LifeSmarts championship, April 25-28

Washington, D.C. — The National Consumers League (NCL) has received a $146,000 grant from Experian^®, the global information services company, to help underwrite LifeSmarts (www.lifesmarts.org), NCL’s 15-year-old program that educates teens and tweens on real-world financial and consumer literacy issues.

“We are grateful for Experian’s support as we help to prepare a new generation of consumers for the challenges of the marketplace,” said Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director. “LifeSmarts is a fun, fast, and educational program, and a great vehicle for educating young consumers.”

LifeSmarts is a competitive educational program, in which teams of students begin online. Top-scorers progress to state competitions, and state champion teams meet each April to compete in the National LifeSmarts Championship. This year’s national event will be hosted by NCL, the nation’s oldest consumer advocacy organization, in St. Louis, MO.

The Experian grant will allow NCL’s LifeSmarts program to forge a new partnership with Family, Career, and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) to bring LifeSmarts to its 220,000 student members nationwide. Also, for the first time this year, NCL will award each of the five students from the 2009 National LifeSmarts champion team—to be determined in St. Louis—a $1,000 academic scholarship, thanks to the grant from Experian.

“Experian is proud to support LifeSmarts and to help NCL expand the program through partnership with FCCLA,” said Rod Griffin, Director of Public Education for Experian. “LifeSmarts competitors will soon be heading off to college or into the workplace where they will be faced with critical financial decisions that can affect the rest of their lives. The LifeSmarts program sets them on the path to a lifetime of success by equipping them with the financial knowledge and consumer skills they need to make informed, responsible choices.”

2009 National LifeSmarts Championship Headed to St. Louis

Consumer savvy teens representing 30 states will compete at the national event. Throughout the 2008-2009 program year, more than 22,000 teens competed online for a chance to represent their states at Nationals. Players answered more than 3 million consumer questions in the online competition.

EVENT INFO

April 25-28, 2009

Millennium Hotel, St. Louis, 200 S. 4^th Street, St. Louis, MO. 63102-1804
Final match: Tuesday, April 28, 10:45 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. Central
Awards Ceremony: 12:00 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. Central

WEBCAST AND WEB COVERAGE

Parents and teachers can follow the action at the official 2009 National LifeSmarts Championship blog (www.lifesmartsnationals.blogspot.com).

The semi-final and final competition matches will be streamed live at www.nextgenweb.org. Visit NextGenWeb for information, vidcasts, podcasts, webinars, and a blog that focus on how broadband technology can benefit the U.S. economy, consumers, health care, education, and the environment.

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About LifeSmarts and the National Consumers League

LifeSmarts is a program of the National Consumers League. State coordinators run the programs on a volunteer basis. For more information, visit: www.lifesmarts.org, email lifesmarts@nclnet.org, or call the National Consumers League’s communications department at 202-835-3323. The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.