Financial Fitness

Securing futures for transition-aged youth, ages 18-30

Financial Fitness is an online, self-paced and flexible program offering financial literacy resources to the young people we serve, to help them achieve greater stability and long-term sustainability.

Friends of Children, through our FOCUS program, has been connecting transition-aged youth ages 18-30, who have foster care experience, to resources, peers and community members with the goal of success, independence and relational permanency. In an effort to expand our intended impact, we have partnered with Just In Time For Foster Youth(JIT), a long-standing agency in San Diego, to begin incorporating their financial literacy model into the work with our FOCUS participants.

  • Financial Fitness helps participants to plan for a secure financial future by gaining the confidence and know-how to practice smart money management and to become knowledgeable about budgeting, smart saving habits, and investment strategies.
  • Participants will be paired with a coach to support them on their journey to financial self-sufficiency.
  • Participants will also come away with $7,000 that they are able to invest in an identified goal such as education, housing, or transportation.

Financial Fitness helps participants to plan for a secure financial future by providing:

Confidence and know-how

So they can practice smart money management, including budgeting, saving habits, and investment strategies.

Coaching support

Participants will be paired with a coach to support them on their journey to financial self-sufficiency.

Concrete funding results

Participants will also come away with $7,000 that they are able to invest in an identified goal such as education, housing, or transportation.

Support Financial Fitness!

“I hope that the Financial Fitness program will have an impact on my outlook and understanding of finances in general. After growing up in poverty, I know that my saving habits and financial literacy have been a bit stunted, which keeps me away from certain opportunities that I'm reaching towards, such as owning property. So by taking the time to work with this program while I'm young, I am hopeful that I will be setting myself up for success in the future.”

What a FOCUS young adult hopes to get out of this program.

Donate Now

HOW IT WORKS

Financial Fitness consists of three courses

Financial Fitness 101

Financial Fitness 101, which spans twelve weeks, empowers participants to begin the journey from surviving to thriving through learning foundational financial literacy concepts to establish healthy money habits.

Each young adult is paired with a coach who supports them as they create a financial action plan.

  • Participants attend one virtual meeting a week (1-2 hours) with their coach;
  • complete 1 financial topic per week in the JIT Network online curriculum;
  • create and implement a financial action plan;
  • practice making informed and healthy decisions with their money;
  • and develop the knowledge and skills for banking, budgeting, and saving consistently.

Each participant is expected to save $100 over the three months of FF101. Upon successful completion, FOCUS matches the $100, creating a total of $200 in each participant's savings account.

Financial Fitness 102

Financial Fitness 102 is the intermediate financial literacy course delivered as a four-week group workshop learning experience with individual weekly assignments. FF 102 provides participants opportunities to further develop core financial literacy concepts while making progress towards financial security/stability by establishing a rainy day fund.

  • Each young adult continues working with their coach from FF 101 to further develop their financial literacy skills.
  • Participants have a confirmed source of income through working, going to school or receiving public assistance.
  • Each young adult  has a checking and savings account with at least $200 saved from FF 101.
  • This four–week cohort includes attending one workshop per week along with completing concurrent activities.

By the end of FF102, participants save $200 and are matched $400. Totaling $600 in savings.

With their combined savings from 101 and 102, participants have a total of $900 at the completion of 102.

Financial Fitness 103

Financial Fitness 103 provides participants opportunities to learn more advanced financial knowledge and skills while focusing on long-term investing over a 14-month time frame.

  • FF 103 consists of 14 monthly workshops on zoom addressing financial topics such as investing, retirement planning, loans, taxes, home ownership, entrepreneurship, and much more.
  • Along with the monthly workshops, participants complete concurrent activities with the support of their coach.

The goal of FF103 is to help participants become knowledgeable investors by learning how to create a diversified, low-cost investment portfolio that reflects the participant's individual goals, risk tolerance, and time horizon. The ongoing workshops are designed to help the young adults make informed and healthy decisions with their money; leverage their knowledge, skills, and resources for a lifetime of financial well-being; cultivate and leverage supportive relationships and networks, and learn how to become knowledgeable investors.

Participants save $150 per month and will be receive $750 in matching funds every 3 months. At the end of 14 months, participants will have saved $2,100 and will have received $3,500 in matching funds as well as a $500 bonus.

All together, that means participants will come away with $7,000 that they are able to invest in an identified goal such as education, housing, or transportation.

At the conclusion of the Financial Fitness Program, participants will be better able to plan for their secure financial future by having the confidence, ability and skills to practice smart money management, as well as concrete funds to begin putting their skills and knowledge into action!

Please consider a donation today to support Financial Futures