Business Administration graduate Morgan Cain and Assistant Professor of Finance and Personal Financial Planning Dr. Preston Cherry are the founders of the Charles Schwab Center for Financial Wellness, a service provided by UW-Green Bay to promote financial well-being in the community. Help people on their financial journey. Cain serves as a peer mentor at the Center, an experience that has been very beneficial to his academic and professional development. He is also president of the Personal Financial Planning Association, a student organization on campus built around the idea of financial wellness. Cain explains how it is easier for students facing financial problems to come to their senses and how encouraging it is to give them the tools to solve their own financial questions and problems. “I’ve interacted with students who are struggling with a particular financial situation, and they come to the Financial Wellness Center to get the answer. Because we’re students, it’s easy to talk to us, so the pressure kind of takes off,” Cain says. According to Dr. Cherry, the Center excels at outreach and helping others because it’s not just a room or a physical space, it’s a place we can go out, so it’s much more than a physical space, it’s a philosophy and helping and social assistance service.”
You can find more information about the Center for Financial Wellness here.
Transcription text: PRESTON CHERRY: We want to create an environment of trust and engagement where people can come, feel like they belong, and learn about their personal finances. That’s why we provide financial education so people can put it aside and improve their financial health. Feel better about their money. – MORGAN CAIN: In my experience working as a peer coach, I have interacted with students who are experiencing particular financial hardship. And they came to the Financial Wellness Center to get the answer to that question. Since we are students, we speak very freely. So that pressure kind of goes away, so it’s like you’re not having to talk to like your family or another professional, maybe having to pay for that service as well. So the service is completely free and low-pressure at the same time. PRESTON CHERRY: Thus, students who pursue financial planning careers use their skills and pass on this knowledge to those seeking help with their personal finances. This means they can come to the Center in person or online. – MORGAN CAIN: I have witnessed these students enter school with a problem and leave to make their own way with some of their own education. It’s very encouraging to see someone come to you with a problem and then leave with that problem, perhaps unresolved, but you’re giving them the tools with which they can actually fix the problem and continue to fix it in their financial journey. PRESTON CHERRY: We teach personal finance workshops in the community. So it’s 90 minutes and we come in for an hour, share financial education information, and then do this Q&A for 30 minutes. In this way, they can have inferences that they can use immediately in their lives. Then we’ll come back because they can either sign up for another presentation or next time we can reach out and go to their location and ask, “how does this stuff work?” we ask. So the Center is not just a room or a physical space, it is a place where we can go out. So it’s a philosophy and a charity and outreach service rather than a physical space.
