White Paper: Online personal finance learning

1. Description of the programme
2. The study
3. What are the outcomes?
4. Key findings
5. Points to consider

Description of the programme

The Open University had created an online learning programme called Managing My Money, which is available for free to members of the public. The programme lasts eight weeks, covers a different financial topic each week. It is delivered via two platforms: FutureLearn and OpenLearn. The report assesses the success of Managing My Money in terms of rates of take-up and completion and of the impact on learners. The purpose of the course is to help people be better equipped to manage their finances and make financial decisions.

The study

The data for the report come from three courses delivered on FutureLearn between May 2014 and October 2015. Start-of-course surveys were offered to everyone who registered for the programme, and a follow-up survey, which was conducted in March 2016.

Whilst more than 53,000 people registered for the course, only around 27,000 people (51 per cent) went on to become learners. Around 7,000 completed the start-of-course survey (this figure comes from tables in the report that show responses to particular questions, but the total base is not given). The follow-up survey was completed by 822 respondents. The methodology is not given, but as the course was online it is safe to assume that both surveys were also completed online.

What are the outcomes?

• Saving behaviour
• Investing behaviour
• Borrowing on a credit card
• Missed payments
• Setting a budget
• Feeling stressed over finances
• Shopping around
• Feeling confused by financial products

Key findings

• Motivation: Most people signed up for the course out of personal interest or because the course was free.
• Demographics: The course was more popular with women than with men; the proportion of younger people (aged 25 and under) registering increased over the three presentations of the course from 9% to 22%; the majority of people registering were in employment, which suggests the ‘bite-size’ design of the course was successful; the majority were educated to degree level and were familiar with online learning.
• Experience of the course: 40% of respondents to the follow-up survey had no prior financial education; the main topic that respondents remembered learning about was financial planning; 80% of respondents said the course had made a difference to them and only 5% said that their financial knowledge had not changed.
• Impact of the course: There was some evidence that some respondents had changed their behaviour since going on the course – fewer had spent on a credit card, or missed a debt payment, more had set a budget and shopped around for a better deal.

Overall, the authors rated the impact of Managing My Money as positive and suggested there were opportunities to extend the course to a wider audience and also to tailor the course for other types of audience.

Points to consider

• Relevance: The research is timely in that it relates to the issue of financial capability and online delivery of learning.
• Generalisability/transferability: It is hard to comment on generalisability; from the registration surveys it appears that the people that registered for the course are from a specific demographic: educated, had used online learning before, in work, mostly female. However it is not clear whether this is the same as the demographic that became active learners. Either way, it seems likely that other demographics, in particular those with less education or those who had not used online learning before, may not respond in the same way to an online course, so may not benefit in the same way, and a different approach may be needed.
• Applicability: The findings are of interest to anyone promoting financial capability but there are limitations with the methodology which mean the value of the study is reduced.
• Methodological strengths or limitations: A limitation is the relatively small numbers who completed the surveys (only 1.5% of those registered completed a follow-up survey). There is no way of knowing whether those who completed the surveys are different in any systematic way from the learners overall. The authors draw attention to some of the limitations; they say that the ideal way to evaluate such a course would be to conduct a randomised controlled trial. They also acknowledge that the findings on impact of the course could be over-stated as they rely on respondents self-reporting changes in behaviour.

Full report

White paper: Online personal finance learning - full report