‘46.8 points.’ This is the financial literacy score of South Korean high school students according to a survey performed by the Youth Financial Education Council, with the results made public in May 2022. It falls far below the failing score of 60 set by the U.S. financial education organization ‘Jump$tart’ and also represents a decline in results from the same survey conducted a decade earlier in 2013.

In response, Hyundai Capital Services has been running the ‘One Company One School Financial Education’ since 2022 by forming partnerships with elementary, middle, and high schools to enhance students’ financial literacy.

The ‘One Company One School Financial Education’ was originally implemented by the Financial Supervisory Service to provide financial education for teenagers. Hyundai Capital Services has increased the program’s effectiveness by incorporating more practical content. In particular, Hyundai Capital Services responded to schools’ requests to assess how students manage their own allowances and enable them to implement smarter consumption habits by designing content applicable to the real world rather than focusing solely on theoretical education.

In 2022, the ‘One Company One School Financial Education’ at Incheon Haesong High School adopted the theme of ‘Smart Consumption Habits and Credit Score Management.’ Hyundai Capital Services drew praise for designing a curriculum that provided students with easily understood financial knowledge that could be applied to their own lives, including topics such as irrational purchasing, assessing overspending, improving credit scores, psychological tests, and financial quizzes.

This type of educational program by Hyundai Capital Services that meets students at their own level was recognized as an outstanding example of financial education in 2023, earning the Financial Supervisory Service Governor’s Award.

Building on this success, Hyundai Capital Services began expanding its financial education initiatives into a ‘Free Semester’ program for middle school students in 2024, in addition to the ‘One Company One School Financial Education’. The ‘Free Semester’ program consists of basic financial education covering eight themes over a semester.

In 2024, Hyundai Capital Services conducted 21 ‘One Company One School’ sessions and 32 ‘Free Semester’ program sessions. To improve financial literacy for a greater number of teens, the company continues to build relationships with schools outside Seoul and Gyeonggi Province for its ‘One Company One School’ program, and is also increasing its focus on youth financial fraud prevention education. This focus stems from the growing societal issue of financial crimes targeting youths, such as youth gambling and small-scale fraud related to paid game items purchases. Hyundai Capital Services plans to strengthen its financial fraud and crime prevention education for teens, continuously encouraging the development of better consumption habits and understanding of economic concepts.