The Orthodox Union’s Living Smarter Jewish program has developed a textbook, the Living Smarter Personal Financial Literacy Curriculum, which includes comprehensive units of study for middle and high school students, designed to provide practical, real-world financial education in an engaging, structured format.
The high school curriculum meets and exceeds New York State financial literacy standards and has been approved by the State of Florida, widely recognized for having some of the most rigorous financial literacy standards in the United States. The curriculum aligns with required benchmarks and prepares students with the knowledge and skills needed to make responsible financial decisions as young adults.
The middle school curriculum is based on nationally recognized financial literacy frameworks, including benchmarks from the Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Financial Literacy and the Council for Economic Education (CEE). These standards help ensure that students build a strong financial foundation before entering high school, learning essential concepts such as saving, spending, credit, risk, and responsible money management in an age-appropriate way.
Both the middle school and high school programs are fully self-contained, meaning everything a teacher needs to teach financial literacy is already included. Each lesson provides guest speaker suggestions, open-ended discussion questions, multiple-choice questions, fill-in-the-blank exercises, short-answer activities, group projects, homework assignments, and quizzes. This structure makes the curriculum easy to implement while encouraging critical thinking, collaboration, and real-world application of financial concepts.
The materials are also thoughtfully designed to engage students. The graphics are bright, colorful, and visually appealing, and the middle school curriculum is especially pleasant and student-friendly, helping younger learners connect with financial topics in a positive and approachable way.
The curriculum is offered at cost, with no profit being made by the OU, Living Smarter Jewish, or the author. The goal is simple: to make high-quality financial literacy education accessible so that as many students and schools as possible can benefit from learning essential life skills for managing money responsibly. To place an order for curriculum textbooks for your school, please contact lsj@ou.org. If you have questions about the curriculum itself, you can also reach out directly to the author, Mrs. Rivka Resnik, at rivkaresnik@gmail.com.