Upcoming Trainings
BNC Financial Skills for Families (BNC Train the Trainer)
Financial Skills for Families is an innovative and culturally-appropriate financial education curriculum developed to enable community members to realize their traditional values by learning financial skills that will help each person make informed financial decisions for themselves, their family and their community and to help Native organizations establish and sustain successful financial education programs.
Taught through national train-the-trainer events across the country with financial educators and practitioners from many different Tribal communities, the BNC Financial Skills for Families national train-the-trainer workshops enable distribution of the most up-to-date, relevant financial knowledge to Native communities, and offers expert training from certified instructors with firsthand experience in Native communities, who are committed to empowering Native communities throughout the country.
Are you a Certified BNC Trainer?
View your BNC Certificate and resources by logging in to the Oweesta Portal.
If you are having trouble logging into the Oweesta portal, contact isaiah@oweesta.org.
To Order Curriculum
To place an order, please contact michelle@oweesta.org
BNC Instructor Guide $19 each
BNC Participant Workbook $18 each
BNC Financial Journal $14 each
BNC Youth Curriculum $30 each
BNC Coaching $10 each (Not for sale at this time)
Not a Certified BNC Trainer?
Register for a BNC Financial Skills for Families training or contact vincent@oweesta.org
BNC Financial Empowerment for Teens and Young Adults (BNC Youth)
The greatest return on investment any community can make is to invest in our youth, helping them realize the dream of our ancestors. This is the goal of of the Building Native Communities (BNC): Financial Empowerment for Teens & Young Adults curriculum. This curriculum focuses on crucial financial skills such as developing a spending plan, money management, saving for an education or emergencies, and buying a home. These financial skills build a foundation for our youth that will allow them to experience financial freedom and self-sufficiency as adults.
Financial education is essential; acquiring these financial skills place youth on the path to financial well-being, which is critical for health and the well-being of for Native communities. These financial skills foster self-sufficient and strong Indigenous economies. This tailored financial education curriculum is designed for youth around 14-22 years of age. It takes a deep dive into the seven different financial literacy lessons, and provides two supplements focusing on student loan debt and managing per capita payments. In addition, the curriculum provides many useful resources like budgeting templates.
BNC Financial Confidence for Elders (BNC Elder)
Building Native Communities: Financial Confidence for Elders is group financial education, similar to the Financial Skills for Families and Financial Empowerment for Teens & Young Adults, providing tool and knowledge specifically for our senior Native community members.
BNC Financial Coaching with Families (BNC Coaching)
Coaching increases client success; individuals and families often need one-one-support to accomplish their financial goals and change financial behaviors. Our financial coaching program will teach you how to have these difficult conversations, and how to keep your clients on track to accomplish their goals.
Coaching is a tool used to create connection that supports health, healing and balance in our relationships with each other and the world around us. Fundamental Native values such as honesty, listening, generosity, respect and connectedness are also the essential foundations of coaching. As a coach, we support our clients’ self-leadership drawing on their innate wholeness, resourcefulness, and creativity to move towards the goals that they have for themselves. Through your work at your Native CDFI or nonprofit organization, you have been supporting the financial health of your community. Integrating coaching skills with your financial expertise will help you co-create relationships with your clients that support a holistic sense of health for themselves, their families and their community.
BNC Financial Coaching with Families Next Level (BNC Coaching 2.0)
The Building Native Communities: Financial Coaching with Families Next Level is an advanced coaching curriculum for practitioners that have gone through the Building Native Communities: Financial Coaching with Families. This three-day intensive training covers topics and skills that are often new to financial counseling and financial education practitioners. This new course further develops listening skills, adds more financial coaching tools to work with clients, and provides an overview of the empowering question paths for practitioners to take their clients.
The BNC Financial Coaching with Families curriculum deepens financial educators’ ability to engage in one-on-one coaching relationships with their clients. Developed in partnership with Seven Sisters Community Development Group, this training is geared towards Financial Education Practitioners that have gone through Coaching training.
BNC Coaching for Credit Building
Credit is a crucial foundation for asset building. The absence of a strong credit score and credit history makes it incredibly challenging for individuals to qualify for loans that are necessary to purchase a home, a car, start a business, or even rent an apartment. The prevalence of predatory and payday lenders creates easy opportunities for individuals to fall into debt and damage their credit, thus hindering their ability to build other assets and financial security.
The objective of this curriculum is to improve the ability of Native coaching and counseling practitioners to guide their clients towards positive credit building practices. The curriculum is complete with tools and exercises for one-on-one sessions.
BNC Trauma-Informed Financial Practitioner
The Building Native Communities: Trauma-informed Financial Practitioner Training is a customized course for Native financial practitioners to become more informed of the trauma created from the current financial systems and how to best support clients with this financial related trauma.
