the population and to cover all financial products and services ; ii ) cooperation, within both the public and private spheres ; and iii ) continuity over time, given the very nature of the objectives. as earlier stated, one of the population groups showing the lowest levels of financial literacy is that of young adults. a key element of the fep is, then, the promotion of financial literacy in schools. in the case of schoolgoers, the notion of “ financial education ” refers to the teaching of knowledge, skills, behaviour, values and aptitudes that help students take 6 / 8 informed and sensible financial decisions in their everyday life, preparing them to better face the basic financial challenges they will encounter throughout their adult life. starting in the 2012 - 2013 academic year, and following the pertinent evaluation of a pilot scheme8, a programme aimed at secondary education students has been developed. it has been rolled out in educational centres that voluntarily decide to participate in this initiative and to impart financial education. indeed, some 500 centres each year throughout spain have taken part. the participant centres have educational material provided by the plan itself, through the gepeese portal, so they may be used by teachers according to their own criteria and programmes. complementing this is specific training for teachers, who are provided with supplementary educational resources ( such as games and workshops ). there is also an annual competition for participating pupils. in fact, on 1 october 2018 i had the opportunity to congratulate the winners of this competition from a school in plasencia. in order to gauge the impact of this school programme, inform society of it and seek to continually improve it, an exhaustive evaluation of the programme was conducted in the 2014 - 2015 academic year. 9 the evaluation of the short - term impact of the programme showed that : pupils following the financial education course obtained better results in financial literacy tests at the end of the year than pupils who did not. in terms of theme - based content, it was found that the financial education course especially increased pupils ’ knowledge in “ bank relations ” ( e. g. opening and closing bank accounts, the consequences of an overdraft and knowledge of bank fees, along with the notion of interest rates and their calculation ). the impact of the course was less evident on matters such as saving, means of payment and responsible consumption. the financial education course was not detected, however, to have any significant impact on pupils ’ decision to have a bank account or card, or on

bonds ), the percentage of incorrect replies to this question is still 40 %. this result would be indicative of the fact that a high number of financial market participants appear not to be aware of the advantages of a fundamental aspect for reducing risk in financial decision - making, namely diversified investment. in any event, the low level of the spanish population ’ s financial literacy evidenced by the survey is not something exclusive to spain ; rather, it is seen worldwide. 2 however, in the particular case of knowledge on diversification, and unlike the other questions, the percentage of correct replies in the population as a whole is significantly lower than that in other developed countries ( 49 % in spain, compared with 62 % in the oecd or eu countries ). the survey microdata are freely accessible for scientific research purposes and are available on the banco de espana website at : https : / / app. bde. es / gnt _ seg / controlaccesoemail. jsp? pas = ecf & lang = en. oecd ( 2017 ), g20 / oecd infe report on adult financial literacy in g20 countries, http : / / www. oecd. org / dat / fin / financialeducation / g20 - oecd - infe - report - adult - financial - literacy - in - g20 _ countries. pdf. 4 / 8 the results reveal some sex and age - based heterogeneity in the degree of familiarity with these basic financial notions. this heterogeneity in financial knowledge has been related in some international studies to actual financial decision - making in households3, such that the level of financial literacy would be higher in the individuals that actually take these decisions. that might suggest either some specialisation in this area within the household, or that financial literacy is acquired through practice. the results of the survey also show that the level of financial literacy in spain increases in step with the level of educational attainment4, as occurs in other developed countries. the age profile observed is also relatively common. in spain, the percentage of correct replies increases with age up to 54 years. above that age, the percentage of correct replies falls and the percentage of interviewees replying “ don ’ t know ” increases. moreover, the percentages of correct replies are particularly low among youths. allow me to focus on this particular group. youth financial literacy according to the results of the survey, one in five adults in