BBVA Compass commits to providing financial education to 10,000 adults in 2019
BBVA Compass launched its full financial education program for 2019 last week, on the heels of a successful four-month pilot program which wrapped in December, aiming to reach approximately 7,000 more people during its first full year in existence.
The BBVA Compass Center for Financial Education Community Partner Program, which was the centerpiece of the bank’s Financial Education Summit in Houston this past week, is designed to provide financial education workshops through partnerships with local nonprofit organizations in the bank’s footprint. Piloted with 28 nonprofit organizations in 2018, the program now includes 50 organizations in 29 markets. The bank expects to more than triple its 2018 participation of 2,900 participants, targeting a total of 10,000 low- to moderate-income adults this year.
The program underscores the bank’s purpose, bringing the age of opportunity to everyone by improving the lives and financial capabilities of the people in the communities served by the bank, according to BBVA Compass Director of Communications and Responsible Business Reymundo Ocañas. In addition, the program provides skills-based volunteer opportunities for bank employees, which augment the bank’s CRA efforts and contributed to its recent outstanding rating.
Workshops are customized to focus on home ownership, personal finance and small business and are led by local bank volunteers with expertise in each of the subject matter areas.
We saw a strong positive response which clearly indicated the need for us to broaden our reach.
“During our pilot last year, we saw a strong positive response which clearly indicated the need for us to broaden our reach,” Ocañas said. "Our goal this year is to expand the program to provide the financial education foundation that creates opportunities for more people to improve their financial capabilities and achieve financial security. We can do that by partnering with even more nonprofit organizations and expanding our geographic reach through our entire footprint.”
The BBVA Compass Foundation, the bank's charitable-giving arm, selected the nonprofits to receive grants and host financial education workshops led by BBVA Compass subject matter experts. These workshops are designed to help participants improve their understanding of the financial system in order to identify and seize opportunities to increase their financial stability. The grant recipients have a demonstrated ability to provide financial capability programming to low- and moderate-income families, to unbanked or underbanked populations, or to small businesses in underserved areas.
BBVA Compass provided the workshop curricula, which it developed using its own subject matter experts in partnership with leading education technology firm EverFi.
We believe we have an obligation to share that expertise.
“As bankers, our expertise lies in the field of financial matters. We believe we have an obligation to share that expertise with the people in our communities,” said Ocañas. “We want to give them the tools and the knowledge to help them make sound, responsible financial choices.”
For more information on the bank’s Center for Financial Education Workshops, please contact fined.us@bbva.com