http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/12/your-money/for-students-of-all-ages-an-online-course-on-retirement-planning.html?_r=0
Tara Siegel Bernard’s article “Finance Class on the Web, for Students of All Ages” stood out as I explored the myriad of economy articles on the NY Times site. Being a student at Baruch where taking finance classes is an opportunity within my reach, reading about the influence basic knowledge of investments, the stock market, retirement and budget balancing made me realize the advantage I have at this school. However, perhaps one doesn’t want to major in finance? What if your classes don’t share or discuss these essential topics? What if you are already out of school and never had the chance to learn about these things? Finance professor Joshua Rauh addresses this issue and creates a series of free online video lectures, complete with interactive graphs and animated visuals that make understanding graduate-level courses on the finances of retirement and pensions simple. Although as freshmen at Baruch, speaking about retirement seems to be a far stretch, having information like this in our back pocket surely helps as we venture into the job market in the near future.
Learning about pensions and retirement comes gives you an understanding of the basic foundation of the economy and business markets today. Wisdom in the stock market and success with investments and funds can be acquired solely through understanding the basics of finance and through knowledge of money management and savings. A free “crash course” such as the one created by Joshua Rauh would provide many people with advice, examples and a helpful perspective on the issues that surround us daily.
As students, we believe the more accessible, informative, intriguing and interactive classes are those that resonate more deeply in our minds. Sometimes a class in finance isn’t enough to answer all the questions that we have. These online lectures give us a choice of whether or not we want to learn more and the best part, no tests. We fill in the possible gaps in our studies and if such courses were created for all business and economics classes, similar to Khan Academy, an incredibly useful resource for many subjects, not only would students be more educated and intrigued, they would have more resources at their fingertips, helping them conquer future job prospects and how to behave in the business market and economy, properly managing their money in an organized, lucrative way.
