13 Mar 2020
Below is a fantastic article on the Australian Government MoneySmart website (www.moneysmart.gov.au) showing the great work we are doing with students here at HSPA. Congratulations to Mrs Portelli and her students.
Celebrating International Women’s Day and Global Money Week
As part of International Women’s Day (8 March), we profiled Cassandra Portelli, a secondary school teacher in NSW. Using Global Money Week, Cassandra is increasing girls’ financial confidence to help them secure their financial futures.
Cassandra Portelli is the Head Teacher of the Mathematics faculty at Hunter School of the Performing Arts in Newcastle. In her 27 years of teaching she has made it a priority to embed financial literacy education across faculties and schools.
In 2016 she won an inaugural CHOOSEMATHS Award for innovative teaching. In 2018 she was the recipient of the NSW Premier’s First State Super Financial Literacy Scholarship and travelled to The Netherlands, Spain, Italy, Canada and the US to research how other countries celebrate Global Money Week and how can these ideas be applied in Australia.
One of the ideas bought back to her school was the publication of students’ stories around money. ‘Money Talks’ (2019) is the result of a financial literacy competition run at the school where students submitted answers to the question: “What is the smartest thing you or someone you know, has done with their money?”
In 2020, Cassandra was successful in applying for the Moneysmart Funding for Principals of Secondary Schools. The school is using the funding to celebrate Global Money Week with a competition inviting the students to demonstrate financial literacy through their chosen performing art.