Kent State and the Ashtabula branch now offer more financial resources to help students prepare for the future.

Steven Dennis, chairman of the finance department for the College of Business, said Kent State offers Personal Finance and Individual Investment Analysis online to help educate students about financial responsibility.

“These courses would be the best way for Kent State students to get an understanding of the financial demands of life as an adult,” Dennis said.

Dennis said Personal Finance will convey the basics of budgeting and managing income to invest. Individual Investment Analysis will teach students how to invest the money they save.

Last fall, the Ashtabula campus designed a financial literacy website to help students navigate a larger web resource called CashCourse, which was created by the National Endowment for Financial Education, or NEFE.

Danielle Weiser-Cline, special assistant for the Office of Academic Services at Ashtabula, said they created the website to help navigate students to specific areas of the NEFE site.

Weiser-Cline said students are mainly concerned about healthy and affordable food, buying technology, student loans and the basics of budgeting.

“We made a smaller website than the NEFE website that directs students directly to those resources,” Weiser-Cline said.

Cline said Ashtabula has incorporated the website into its First Year Experience courses, requiring students to use the website to complete assignments.

Zachary Aichele, a freshman integrated language arts major, said he thought he had a good understanding of what his living expenses were, but he was shocked when he decided to compare prices.

“Going to the bookstore rather than Walmart and seeing the difference stood out to me,” Aichele said.

Dennis said these courses will help students understand the difference between good and bad financial decisions and the long-term effects they can have.

“Student loan debt for tuition or for laptops are very good investments,” Dennis said. “If it’s student loan debt to support a lifestyle, then those are not great decisions.”

Students need to pay attention to their student loan debt, Dennis said, because too much debt will have a significant impact on their future lifestyle.

“A lot of students are going to have student loans, but you want to make sure you only borrow money to invest in your human capital,” Dennis said.

Contact Nathan Havenner at [email protected].