Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I believe the poet Clement Clark Moore was predicting something exactly 200 years ago about 2023's financial education policy wins in the United States between the lines of his December 1823 poem best known by its iconic first verse, 'Twas The Night Before Christmas. Find out the shocking never-before-seen details of Moore's predictions in this fun Best of 2023 post!

You probably know the Clement Clark Moore poem "A Visit from Saint Nicholas," which features famous verses like:

The children were nestled all snug in their beds;
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;

and

Now, Dasher! Now, Dancer! Now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! On, Cupid! On, Donder and Blitzen!

What you might not know is that Mr. Moore was an all-seeing financial education policy oracle who was sending a message through time and space to advocates exactly 200 years in the future. He precisely predicted what would happen with the movement in 2023!

Indeed, the year 2023 led to several big wins for the financial education movement, all of which Mr. Moore predicted in 1823 if you read between the lines:

• Eight reindeer drove Saint Nicholas's sleigh (Dasher, Dancer, etc). Eight new states - West Virginia, Indiana, Minnesota, Connecticut, Louisiana, Oregon, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania - adopted personal finance graduation requirements of at least one semester for all high school students in 2023. Coincidence?
• The poem in its entirety is 540 words. This community's 2023 advocacy efforts will provide approximately 540,000 more students per year with guaranteed personal finance courses once all these recently adopted policies are implemented, bringing us to a grand total of nearly 54% of all U.S. high schoolers taking this course. Coincidence?
• The name Clement Clark Moore has 17 characters. There are now 17 states that are in various stages of implementing standalone personal finance courses for their high school students. Coincidence?
• Some scholars argue that the iconic poem was originally written in Dutch by a Dutch-American farmer, Henry Livingston Jr., and later stolen by Moore and translated to the English version we know now. These scholars also find that the original Dutch name for the reindeer Donder was actually... Dunder. Just as Clement Clark Moore predicted, in the American spinoff of the British comedy series The Office, the cast of oddball characters from a wholesale paper company named Dunder & Mifflin has been making viewers chuckle for years. The fictional paper company is based in Pennsylvania, which is the latest state to have adopted a standalone personal finance graduation requirement of at least one semester in December, 2023. Coincidence? You be the judge.

I'm glad to see Mr. Moore's poetic 1823 predictions - stolen or not - came true two centuries later.

In all seriousness, though, it's been a wonderful year for advocates for financial education, and the students you serve - both now and in future generations.

Plus, lots of people are taking note! Readers, listeners, and viewers found out about your amazing advocacy work this year in 165+ national and local news stories that mentioned the movement to guarantee access to personal finance courses, including:

• national coverage from the New York Times, NPR, Washington Post, and PBS Newshour,
• state-specific coverage from WV Public Radio, CT Post, Indy Star, and the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel,
• financial industry coverage from CNBC, Kiplingers, Nerdwallet, Marketplace, and Morningstar, and 
• education coverage from K12 Dive, Ed Week, Edutopia, ASCD, District Administrator, KQED, The74, and more!

I'll wrap up with some opportunities for 2024, confident that these won't take 200 years to come true.

1. California voters may have the opportunity to approve a new personal finance graduation requirement for all high school students on the November 2024 ballot, with the support of the Californians for Financial Education campaign!
2. The New York State Board of Regents has an opportunity to adopt the state's Blue Ribbon Commission recommendation to add a personal finance credit requirement for all New York high school students, as requested by thousands of New Yorkers.
3. Dozens of bills will be surfacing in January in the 25 states that have not yet adopted this policy, presenting great opportunities for advocates like you to get involved and make meaningful change.
4. School Districts, State Boards and State Departments of Education will all have opportunities to take leading roles in successfully implementing this popular policy, but they won't have to go it alone. It's been an honor for the NGPF team to work with so many educators, district administrators, and state education officers as these courses roll out in new states!

Look out for bills making their way through state legislatures with NGPF's Financial Education Bill Tracker (which will flip over to track 2024 bills ahead of January 1st), share live updates about the movement via NGPF's LIVE U.S. Dashboard, and look out for many ~Moore~ bright spots in the year to come. Happy Holidays!

About the Author

Christian Sherrill

Former teacher, forever financial education nerd. As NGPF's Director of Growth & Advocacy, Christian is laser-focused on our mission to guarantee all students a rigorous personal finance course before crossing the high school graduation stage. Having paid down over $40k in student loans in the span of 3 years - while living in the Bay Area on an entry level teacher's salary - he's eager to help the next generation avoid financial pitfalls one semester at a time.