The John and Doris Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences at the University of Arizona will celebrate "A Purrrrfect Time to Take Charge" and Wilbur Wildcat's 50th birthday on Friday. The day includes a special back-to-school experience for alumni and friends and the school's annual Council of Alumni and Friends Homecoming Luncheon and Awards Ceremony at McClelland Park.
As a highlight of the day's events, alumni can relive the classroom experience with a lecture by Mike Staten, director of the Norton School's Take Charge America Institute, or TCAI. Staten's 30-minute lecture will delve into how the Norton School and partner organizations are helping students, teachers and others "take charge" of financial literacy – the quest that drives TCAI.
"Researchers have shown clear links between financial distress and other problems: marital issues, lower work performance and even illness," Staten said. "The Take Charge America Institute grew out of the question, How much can we boost quality of life just by helping young people make better financial choices and learn how to manage their money?"
An ongoing study at the Norton School – Arizona Pathways to Life Success for University Students, or APLUS – offers some of the strongest evidence yet that exposure to financial education during K-12 years can significantly increase a young person's financial literacy later in life, even among students whose parents didn't provide good financial mentoring or role modeling.
Parents, it turns out, had the biggest impact on students participating in the APLUS study – more than work and high school financial education combined.
At the annual Family and Consumer Sciences Luncheon scheduled for that day, the Norton School will welcome Jane Rojas, a senior vice president at Morgan Stanley Smith Barney, who will share the industry perspective on financial literacy. During the luncheon, the school also will honor award recipients in several categories:
For all but the most recent alumni, the back-to-school event also offers an opportunity to check out the new home for the UA's Family and Consumer Sciences Program, McClelland Park.
Contributions from more than 2,000 individual and corporate partners funded the $25 million building and surrounding outdoor spaces, which houses the Frances McClelland Institute for Children, Youth and Families, the Terry J. Lundgren Center for Retailing, and the Take Charge America Institute for Consumer Financial Education and Research (TCAI), as well as the School's Cooperative Extension Program.
Activities will take place at McClelland Park on the UA campus, located at 650 N. Park Ave. The schedule is as follows:
Michael E. Staten holds the Take Charge America Endowed Chair in the Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences at the University of Arizona and directs the Take Charge America Institute for personal financial education and research.
Nationally recognized as an expert on retail credit market policy issues, Staten has often testified before Congress and various state legislatures and has designed and conducted research projects on a wide range of policy-oriented issues involving consumer and mortgage credit markets, initially as director of the Credit Research Center at Purdue University and later as Distinguished Professor and Executive Director of the relocated Credit Research Center at Georgetown University and the George Washington University School of Business.
The John and Doris Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences within the UA College of Agriculture and Life Sciences houses the Terry J. Lundgren Center for Retailing, the Frances McClelland Institute for Children, Youth and Families and the Take Charge America Institute for Consumer Financial Education and Research. The Norton School offers undergraduate, master's and doctoral programs in family studies and human development as well as retailing and consumer sciences.
Kimberley Brooke
Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences