RCBC DiskarTech and DepEd instill FinEd to youth

Education is the best gift anyone can get in their lives. It helps young ones be ready for the years ahead with the necessary tools to survive and, most especially, thrive. But education is not something you can only get inside the four walls of the classroom. And truth be told, many of us who are now in the workforce discovered that many aspects of professional life aren’t taught, or deeply tackled, in schools, from the simple thighs like properly responding to emails to bigger and long-term decisions relating to finances.

To help prepare today’s youth for the challenges of the future, the Philippine Youth Convergence (PYC) was held in Puerto Princesa, Palawan where over 2,000 senior high students got great advice from a number of speakers. Among the topics talked about during the three-day conference are financial education and digital literacy, which were discussed further through the partnership of the Department of Education (DepEd) and Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) and its financial inclusion super app DiskarTech.

“It is our goal in DepED to train your minds and mend your hearts to develop your skills to bring positive change in our society,” said Asec. Juan Valeriano Respicio IV in Filipino during the conference’s opening activity. “The department believes in the youth’s untapped potential in delivering change in society.”  

DepEd has continuously given importance to financial education as one of the steering committee members of the National Strategy for Financial Inclusion. In the panel discussion, RCBC executive vice president and chief innovation and inclusion officer Lito Villanueva also encouraged students to have an enterprising mindset by underscoring RCBC’s DiskarTechpreneur, a business case competition being piloted in two regions.

“We encourage our students to create an inclusive business case that would have an impact on their communities,” said Lito.

The top student teams will be given seed money and professional mentoring support from RCBC and DiskarTech managers. The team with the best business case will win P50,000 and smartphones to make their entrepreneurial initiative a viable enterprise.

During the event, then DepEd Secretary Leonor Magtolis Briones emphasized that learning should not be limited to the classroom and challenge students to learn lessons from real-life experiences. 

“The wisdom that you will gather will not come from your school nor from books. It will come from life itself,” said Sec. Briones.

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