Three New York credit unions will receive national recognition at the 2020 CUNA Governmental Affairs Conference. CORE FCU, Alternatives FCU and Good Neighbors FCU will be honored for their exceptional commitment to youth and adult financial education.

All three credit unions previously earned first-place state-level recognition awards from the New York Credit Union Association.

CORE FCU has been selected as a first-place recipient of the national Desjardins Youth Financial Education Award. CORE FCU has an established, well-developed student financial literacy program, but the credit union continued to add unique new initiatives last year as the program grew and developed. In recent years, the credit union expanded its highly regarded and effective youth financial literacy program by enhancing their peer-mentoring and creative student learning efforts; bringing new technology to their classroom lessons; adding new gamification to their initiatives; and facilitating a new student-taught finance initiative.

Alternatives FCU has been selected as a first-place recipient of the national Desjardins Adult Financial Education Award. Alternatives offers the Ithaca community a suite of financial literacy products geared toward adults: Financial Wellness; Business CENTS (Community Enterprise Networking and Training Services); Free Tax Preparation; and Lending and Credit Repair. The programs include free one-on-one counseling, realistic goal-setting, business consultations, networking events, tax preparation assistance, complimentary educational sessions, and more. In total, Alternatives devoted more than 18,000 hours to financial education in 2018 and reached more than 4,000 individuals.

Good Neighbors FCU has been selected as a second-place recipient of the national Desjardins Adult Financial Education Award. Over the past two years, the credit union has partnered with a refugee resettlement agency, the International Institute of Buffalo, to bring financial literacy workshops to their clients. Every month, the credit union visits the institute to facilitate a two-hour workshop on financial literacy basics, which covers topics such as banks, credit unions, types of accounts, credit, and how to establish credit. Last year, the credit union taught financial literacy to about 240 immigrants and refugees, about 40 of whom opened accounts with the credit union.

All national award recipients will be recognized at CUNA’s 2020 GAC, scheduled for Feb. 23 – 27, in Washington, D.C.