Dominique Ghazar of HSBC, Don Sedlock of JA Worldwide, and Gus Schmedlen of Merlyn Mind and the JA Worldwide Board of Governors on stage at the RewirEd Summit in Dubai.
JA staff from around the world joined other leaders from the global education community at the RewirEd Summit in Dubai to imagine and launch a new wave of innovation and opportunity for young people.
The world’s largest education conference, the RewirEd Summit is led by Dubai Cares, in partnership with Expo 2020 Dubai and in close coordination with the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. Attendees have access to plenary sessions, breakouts, and classes organized around three themes:
Youth, Skills, and the Future of Work
Innovation and Education
Education Financing
Yesterday, the opening day of the summit, our CEO, Asheesh Advani, moderated a panel discussion titled “Financial Capability: A Critical Skill for Youth Today and in the Future,” along with three panelists:
Dominique Ghazar, Senior Sustainability Manager, Future Skills Lead, HSBC Bank Middle East Limited
Don Sedlock, Director, Global Development Projects, JA Worldwide
Gus Schmedlen, President & Chief Revenue Officer, Merlyn Mind, and Learning Experiences Committee Co-Chair, JA Worldwide Board of Governors
Discussion centered on questions, including:
What is financial capability, and why does it matter?
What is the difference between financial literacy and financial capability?
What does financial capability have to do with resilience and sustainable living?
What can we do to enable more young people to become financially capable?
The panel offered an opportunity to share key learnings and best practices emerging from one of our newest initiatives, JA Building a Financially Capable Generation. The initiative, developed in partnership with HSBC, includes an innovative, skills-based curriculum built on FinQuest, an educational app, and aims to help youth increase their self-efficacy, knowledge, and skills through gamification and simulated learning. Thirteen JA locations and more than 200 HSBC volunteers piloted the initiative last year with 7,000 students, and four more locations will join the effort in 2022.
Watch the session on the @RewirEd2021 YouTube channel.