Our Commitment to Charity
Our Chosen Charity
About MyBnk
MyBnk is a charity that delivers financial and enterprise education programmes directly to 11-25 year olds in schools and youth organisations. MyBnk have helped 160,000 young people learn how to manage their money and make enterprising choices through fun and interactive sessions. Young people are at the heart of everything MyBnk do and help them design programmes through their Youth Advisory Panel. MyBnk also provides enterprise experiences using real money and ethical products and runs the youth homeless prevention programme, The Money House. MyBnk projects are proven and evaluated by The Money Advice Service.
Why They Do It
UK personal debt is over £1.5 trillion and 90% of the UK population have never received any form of money management lessons. Nearly half of 16-25 year olds name debt as their biggest fear. In an ever tightening job market, this generation will have to make smarter financial decisions and create their own opportunities. Recent studies show teachers and parents lack the confidence and expertise to effectively teach young people how to manage their money.
Where They Do It
MyBnk currently operate in schools and youth organisations in London and its surrounding areas, the South Coast and South West and North of England. From ARK Academies to the Prince’s Trust, MyBnk have forged partnerships with over 750 organisations including Leaving Care Units, Pupil Referral Units and Young Offenders Institutions to ensure we reach out to the most disadvantaged and financially vulnerable young people. MyBnk experts carefully map workshops into each school’s curriculum, and embed financial capability into youth organisations’ existing support programmes for young people. MyBnk also has extensive experience designing projects and training programmes for other organisations.
MyBnk Impact
MyBnk are helping to create a generation of informed financial consumers who engage with the financial system so it works for them, not against them. MyBnk programmes increase financial awareness from an early age, setting young people on a positive trajectory and helping them understand how the decisions they make around money will affect their futures.
MyBnk give young people a ‘reality check’ of the cost of independent living and the consequences of unsustainable debt. But we also demonstrate the rewards effective money management brings – this affects behavioural change and encouraging them to develop a responsible and informed attitude towards money to stay in control of their finances. MyBnk also provides the opportunity to access small interest-free loans to turn young people’s business ideas into reality. This gives an exciting, tangible experience of learning by doing. Young people develop enterprise skills such as the ability to assess risk and learn from failure, skills which will enable them to face an increasingly competitive job market. They are able to implement their own ideas and increase their self-belief and confidence in seeing them come to fruition. The real life nature of MyBnk’s enterprise programmes is key – young people have to convince others of the validity of their ideas and are given loans (not grants) to make them a reality.
What We Give to Charity
- An annual charity donation
- £20 donated for every new client recommended to us by an existing NorthStar client
- At least one major fund-raising event each year
Our 2018 Charity Fundraising Event
“Most people don’t plan to fail, they fail to plan.”
John L. Beckley
Awards, Accreditations & Trade Associations
At NorthStar, we are committed to delivering the best service to our clients and working to the very highest professional standards. Our work has been rewarded with a number of awards and professional accreditations. We are also members of the leading financial services professional trade associations.
