Curious about managing money in university? Julia Graham shares great tips!
Welcome to The Carillon’s new finance column! Pall Agarwal covers important economic and financial news from Canada and around the world, explaining what it means for students. From tuition costs to job markets, Pall breaks down how these changes affect you, making finance easy to understand and relevant to your life. If you have any request for a topic or want Pall to highlight a stock price – send an email to pall@carillonregina.com. Let’s make finance fun for all!
Disclaimer: The information in this column is intended for educational purposes only and is not financial advice. For personalized financial guidance, please consult a licensed professional
This week I had a chance to interview Julia Graham, an alumna from the Hill School of Business at the University of Regina. Graham is currently an accountant in assurance at MNP, and pursuing her CPA designation and master’s in professional accounting.
As a dedicated advocate for financial literacy and student empowerment, during the 2023- 2024 academic year Graham served as a project manager with Enactus Regina, where she launched Dollars and Sense, an initiative aimed at educating university students on personal finance. This program equipped students with the knowledge and tools necessary to make informed financial decisions, setting them up for long-term success. She also served as a mental health ambassador, demonstrating her commitment to holistic student well-being.
My goal with the interview was to hear her insights from the program and learn the status of financial literacy awareness at University of Regina.
How did you conduct this Dollars and Sense ? How was the overall experience for you?
We did six sessions of different topics such as budgeting, psychology and the overall idea behind financial literacy, investing, taxes and different types of investment mediums. So that was really good. It was a really good experience for me to be able to understand as someone who comes from a very financially privileged background. I was always talking about financial literacy with my parents when I was younger. I remember asking my dad about the stock market at 16 trying to get an understanding…so I don’t always understand or remember what students, who maybe never talked about money, haven’t come across and what they learned or didn’t learn from their parents. This project was a real eye opener for me.
What was eye-opening for you?
I saw that increase of basic financial literacy knowledge, such as different investing accounts, different budgeting types, different types of debt.
There were students come from different faculties, different backgrounds, which provided me with knowledge on what they are learning in school and talking about with their friends.
I remember one student asking me questions afterwards, like ‘Where do I start?’ If you don’t even know where to start for financial literacy, it’s very hard because it’s such a vast area of knowledge that it can be overwhelming. Beginning your own financial literacy can be overwhelming, so I spoke about the the basics. I also provided some thought-provoking questions afterwards and optional homework for students, which was to audit their own bank statements, to see they felt they received value from each of their transactions. And then they looked at what their overall expenses are compared to their income. So it was about having students think about their own financial state.
How did you manage your money as a student and what advice would you give your peers?
University is really hard. It is really expensive and on top of tuition and living costs, there’s all these other costs if you want to go to networking events or buy clothes for interviews or galas. I think the most important thing as a student that [is] likely not earning a full-time wage, but earning money on the side, is to give yourself some grace. It was really important for me to understand that I didn’t need to be saving 30 to 40 per cent of my income during that time because my income from teaching assistance and working summer jobs was going to pay for tuition books and gas. You don’t have to make progress on your financial goals while you’re a student. You just have to stay afloat because your goal right now is getting that education so you can make those financial progressions once you graduate.
