MSE’S ‘Academoney’ support discussion thread

Former_MSE_Molly

DIWEDDARIAD Mawrth 2021: Mae cwrs ‘Academoney’ bellach wedi’i gyfieithu i’r Gymraeg. Cofrestrwch i gwblhau’r cwrs yn Gymrae yn fan hyn, ac am fwy o wybodaeth, gwelwch stori newyddion ddiweddaraf MSE.

UPDATE March 2021: The ‘Academoney’ course has now been translated into Welsh. Sign up to do the course in Welsh here and English here, and to find out more about the translated course, see MSE’s latest news story.

Hello MoneySavers!

If you haven’t already heard, the MoneySavingExpert.com team has some exciting news! We’ve teamed up with world-leading learning institution, The Open University (OU) to launch a new, completely free and independent academic course, to help give the nation the skills and knowledge to truly master their finances. You can read the full news story here.

The course – MSE’s Academy of Money – is prepared and written by The Open University, with support and guidance from MSE. It’s made up of six two-hour sessions of study covering all the key aspects of personal finance.

It’s a major project that we, Martin and the OU are all extremely proud of, so we wanted to create a dedicated space on the Forum for those of you taking part.

This thread is designed especially for those of you choosing to enrol on the course, aka ‘Academoney students’, as an area for you to chat freely about how you’re getting on, any grey areas where you may need a helping hand, or words of encouragement.

You can sign up to the course here, but before that, we’ve included a brief overview below so you know what to expect:

• MSE’s Academy of Money is written by The OU, with support and guidance from MSE.
• It is made up of six two-hour study sessions, packed with videos, audios, quizzes and activities, covering all the key aspects of personal finance, including spending, borrowing, mortgages, saving, investing and retirement. So it should take you around 12 hours in all to complete.
• It’s hosted on the OU’s OpenLearn platform, and is a flexible course, allowing you to study at your own pace. You can even choose to complete just one topic to brush up – but to get the OpenLearn Badge, you’ll have to complete all six.
• It is available to anyone, for free.
• Enrolling on the course will give you the opportunity to earn an OU digital badge and a statement of participation once you’ve completed all six parts and an end-of-course quiz. You can share your badge with friends, family and employers, as well as with others here on the Forum!

What is a badged course?

Badged courses from The OU provide another way of helping you to progress from informal to formal learning, as well as educating communities remotely. They are available on the OU’s OpenLearn website and do not cost anything to study. They differ from OU courses because you do not receive support from a tutor, but you do get useful feedback from the interactive quizzes.

So there you have it – will you be joining the ‘Academoney’? Let us know and post below!

- MSE Molly

Hetta

I have enrolled onto the course and it’s very timely as I was thinking of investments and retirement funds. 

fatbelly

I've signed up to it. So far it's more OU than mse but let's see how it goes.

[Deleted User]

Do you need an account to do it?

Hetta

You do need to set an account to do it @GabiB

claremylove

All enrolled    Looking forward to seeing what the course is like!

Dianic

I'm signing up and have told my daughter about it too - saw it on Martin's show the other night. Any help for someone whose late hubby took all the responsibility for bills previously, has got to be a good thing.

[Deleted User]

Will be signing up!

Karen0007

I've just enrolled.  Hoping I can enthuse my teenagers to do it after me while keeping my brain ticking over while in furlough. 

MollyR

It should be interesting;  all my financial knowledge has simply been accumulated over the years, I have never actually learned it as an education subject, so I am sure this will fill in gaps in my knowledge.  And it is a new little hobby for lockdown!

I wonder whether, when we complete the course, MSE will make it possible for us to add the OU badge to the collection in our profiles?

[Deleted User]

MollyR said:

It should be interesting;  all my financial knowledge has simply been accumulated over the years, I have never actually learned it as an education subject, so I am sure this will fill in gaps in my knowledge.  And it is a new little hobby for lockdown!

I wonder whether, when we complete the course, MSE will make it possible for us to add the OU badge to the collection in our profiles?

I was thinking that too! Not sure if they could if the OU use a different system, but would be brilliant if they did.