Do those cents really add up?

The Mof's One Year National Savings Service Badge.

When I was in primary school in the 1970s, the local Commonwealth Bank staff would visit the school regularly for children to deposit small amounts of money into their school savings accounts. These were interest-bearing deposit accounts which converted to regular bank accounts when the children left school. 'School Banking Day' was a long-standing tradition.

There is a excellent short filmclip at the Australian Screen website showing school children arriving at school in 1951 and giving their teacher small deposits of coins which he records in their bank books.

Before our time, the concept of regular bank savings was drummed into children from a young age, and it was not a phenomenon particular to Australia.

The Mof recalls that in Scotland:

The maxim of, "Look after the pence and the pounds will look after themselves," was drilled into us as children and we were encouraged to save whatever we earned or were given. Apart from the piggy bank, which could be rifled in desperation, one of the common ways to save was through the National Savings scheme.

The National Savings scheme was started in Britain during the First World War. The British Government introduced several ways to save as they needed both to reduce borrowings and raise funds for the war effort. The National Savings Movement, as it was originally called, grew from volunteers who organised Local Savings Committees and was launched at the Guildhall in London in 1916 with the intent to encourage British people to save and prosper.

Groups were formed in factories, shops, clubs and schools with an organiser collecting and recording the monies on a weekly basis. Savings took the form of savings stamps, certificates and bonds.

On a personal level I first encountered National Savings as it came to be known, as a student in primary school. Every Monday morning children arrived with their few pennies (the well off ones may have had a shilling!) to be collected and recorded by the teacher. On reaching a certain amount, which may have been 20 shillings (one
pound) or perhaps 21 shillings (a guinea) the child was given a savings certificate.

Later as a teacher I was on the collecting and recording side. Every year a district National Savings conference was held at a very swish hotel -- one I would never have been able to frequent as a humble teacher!

Service badges were awarded to the volunteer collectors. The one year badge was as far as I aspired, as I then married and came to Australia.

Nowadays we still encourage our children to save, but I suspect that the physicality of clutching coins in your sweaty hand on the way to school, handing them over and watching as the numbers recorded in your passbook grew each week is somewhat diluted by e-banking methods.

Although my husband and I insist that our daughters save some of their pocket money each week, it is transferred automatically via a direct debit to their account. It must be hard for them to imagine that the money even exists!

They do however, 'save up' their disposable pocket money in their purses for things they want to buy, and the youngest has started collecting every stray five cent piece she finds around the place and putting them into a container in the kitchen. It is surprising how many wayward five cents there are in this world! It's a slow process, but she now has a couple of dollars in the container. For her, this provides the joy that 1950s children may have had watching their bank deposits grow.

Does the electronic nature of banking today challenge children's concepts of long-term saving? Do school banking savings schemes still exist? How do you encourage children to save for the future?