State Treasurer John Perdue recently helped kick off a community-based “Make Cents WV” initiative, designed to provide students a web-based variety of financial literacy tools.

The Education Alliance, West Virginia GEAR UP, Treasurer Perdue’s office and a host of other partners helped announce the news.

GEAR UP, a college readiness project coordinated by the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission, provided an instrumental grant.

The project provides financial literacy measures through a new website called www.MakeCentsWV.com, which provides the resources. The site serves as a clearinghouse for measures that promote wise and informed financial choices.

“I decided long ago that the State Treasurer should play a major role in providing financial education to the people of our state,” Perdue said. “I truly believe it is the number one way we can empower both children and adults.

“Over the past several years, my office has worked with the Department of Education and many others to help teach our kids how to create a family budget through a participatory activity we administer.”

Perdue said members of the partnerships have identified three goals:

• To implement financial literacy lessons in 100 classrooms across the state by 2018;
• To increase participating West Virginia students’ financial literacy by 50 percent, and
  
• To support the Higher Education Policy Commission’s goal of ensuring that 60 percent of state high school seniors complete a Free Application for Federal Student Aid.