Last month, Gifting Sense was recognized as one of the Best Non-profit School-aged Financial Education Programs at the Money Awareness and Inclusion Awards—the MAIAs! We were absolutely thrilled to see our work stand beside that of the University of Chicago, which has a highly respected Financial Education Initiative. When announcing the results, Financial Times Deputy Editor Patrick Jenkins stated that ours “…was an important and hotly contested category with submissions from around the world, although the winner and runner-up were both strong entries from North America.”
In fact, the inaugural MAIAs had over 150 entries from organizations operating in over 100 countries across the globe. Named after the Greek Goddess of growth and nurturing, they address six of the seventeen United Nations Sustainable Development Goals:
- #1) No Poverty,
- #4) Quality Education,
- #5) Gender Equality,
- #8) Decent Work & Economic Growth,
- #10) Reduced Inequalities, and
- #12) Responsible Consumption & Production.
“Money Awareness” was chosen over “Financial Literacy” because “finance” can be off-putting to some, and even “literacy” can carry negative associations. And the MAIAs are all about making money easier for as many people as possible!
“The runner-up, Gifting Sense, is focused on building children’s ability to think before they buy…Equipped with a Does It Make Sense? (DIMS) Score calculator that creates a pause before purchase, Gifting Sense hopes that when children learn how not to waste money, families will experience increased harmony, improved financial well-being, and the knowledge that they are protecting the planet.”
Patrick Jenkins, Deputy Editor, The Financial Times
“Think before you buy. What I love about this is how it targets one very specific moment in our lives…and uses it as a springboard to more understanding of money.”
Michael Gilmore, Co-Founder of the Money Awareness & Inclusion Awards
You can learn more about the MAIAs here. You can see all the 2022 winners here. Being in the company of financial education icons like Annamaria Lusardi (the Distinguished Scholar and Professor of Economics and Accountancy at The George Washington University School of Business) is very exciting for early financial education champions like us. Professor Lussardi won Best Academic Paper with “Financial Education Affects Financial Knowledge and Downstream Behaviours”: a meta-analysis across 33 countries.
What is it Margaret Mead used to say? “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world.” THANK YOU to the MAIAs and all the schools, parents, young people, and personal finance experts who have already embraced the Gifting Sense Project. There are miles to go before we sleep, but we’re closer than ever to kids everywhere, never even thinking about buying something unless they know it’s DIMS SCORE!
If you want to test drive the DIMS—Does It Make Sense?® Score calculator or learn more about how it works, please click on the pink or green buttons below. Here’s to early financial education and all that it can accomplish—which is a lot!
Child Development Financial Literacy For Parents For Teachers
