Congressional Briefing - November 8, 2010
Unique Educational Games for Financial Literacy
Speakers: |
Timothy Flacke and Nick Maynard |
Date: |
Monday, November 8, 2010 |
Time: |
1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. |
Location: |
2220 Rayburn House Office Building |
| View the Video Listen to the Audio |
About the Program
Few Americans understand how and why to manage their money and save for retirement. With the support of the Social Security Administration, the Financial Literacy Center was launched in the fall of 2009 by the RAND Corporation, Dartmouth College, and the Wharton School to develop and test innovative programs to improve the financial literacy and economic security of the American public.
The Financial Literacy Center is
- developing educational materials targeted to people at different stages of their lives — young workers, mid-career workers, those approaching retirement, and retirees
- making a special effort to improve financial skills of low-income and minority workers, the most vulnerable groups during economic downturns
- funding Doorways to Dreams (D2D), a nonprofit organization founded by Harvard Business School professor Peter Tufano that is dedicated to expanding financial services to the working poor.
D2D Fund is developing a series of video games that teach important lessons about financial management, such as the wise use of debit cards and credit cards, the importance of saving, and how interest compounds. This briefing will describe the value of financial entertainment as an educational tool, demonstrate two games to be released in November, and describe plans to disseminate and test their effectiveness.
About the Speakers:
Aileen Heinberg an associate behavioral scientist at RAND, will introduce the two speakers. She has a Ph.D. in psychology from UCLA with a specialization in decision making.
Timothy Flacke is the executive director of Doorways to Dreams (D2D) Fund, serves on the organization's Board of Directors and helped launch D2D in 2001. Tim has seventeen years' experience helping lower-income people focus on saving, in both the private and non-profit sectors. He co-authored The Individual Development Account (IDA) Program Design Handbook and Dollar $ense, a financial education curriculum for IDA programs. He holds an M.P.P. from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a B.A. in philosophy from Boston College.
Nick Maynard is the director of Innovation at D2D Fund. Since joining D2D in 2006, Nick has led the financial entertainment project, managed the Save to Win pilot in Michigan, and explored cutting-edge market research on low-income savers. Prior to joining D2D, Nick spent a decade as an operational strategy consultant at Deloitte Consulting and Braxton Associates where he advised Fortune 1000 clients, including the successful turnaround of Greyhound Bus Lines in 2004-2005. He holds an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School, an M.P.P. from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a B.S. in engineering from Princeton University.
About RAND
The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit institution that helps improve policy and decisionmaking through research and analysis. RAND focuses on the issues that matter most such as health, education, national security, international affairs, law and business, the environment, and more. As a nonpartisan organization, RAND operates independent of political and commercial pressures. We serve the public interest by helping lawmakers reach informed decisions on the nation's pressing challenges.
Further Inquiries
For further information about this event, contact the Office of Congressional Relations at ocr@rand.org or call (703) 413-1100, ext. 5395.