Is a high school course with personal finance concepts required to be taken as a graduation requirement? No, personal finance is not included in the graduation requirements, either as a stand-alone course or embedded in another course. Alaska high school students must earn a minimum of 21 credits with 3 credits in social studies.
No policy change is pending that would change Alaska's grade.
Alaska has minimal personal finance standards. Alaska has economics concepts in the government and citizenship standards, but these standards do not include personal finance concepts. Alaska has employability standards that include certain concepts contained in the Earning Income section of the National Standards for Personal Finance Education.
In March 2023, a bill was introduced in Alaska's Senate (SB 99) that would require high school students to take a stand-alone personal finance course as a high school graduation requirement.
The government and citizen standards are part of Alaska's social studies standards. The social studies standards were last adopted in 2005 and are in the process of being revised. It is expected that they will be finalized sometime in 2023. It is not clear how Alaska measures student achievement in financial literacy or how the state monitors local school district implementation of the financial literacy education requirement.
2028