In 2024, the CFP Board accredited 179 undergraduate faculties making ready college students for careers in monetary planning. How is a potential monetary planner supposed to find out which program affords the perfect preparation for fulfillment? The outcomes of the FPA Monetary Planning Problem level college students to a solution.
Annually since 2010, the Monetary Planning Affiliation has invited faculties with CFP Board-registered monetary planning packages to compete within the FPA Monetary Planning Problem. Scores of faculties yearly subject groups of their greatest monetary planning college students.
Primarily based on three rounds of analysis, every year, the FPA selects the eight highest-scoring school groups to compete for high honors. The groups are put to the check on the FPA’s nationwide convention. They compete in a rigorous ultimate testing understanding of economic planning ideas, analytical capability, technical rigor and presentation abilities judged by a panel of working monetary advisors.
The highest three finishers go dwelling with scholarship prizes, bragging rights for the varsity’s monetary planning program and enhanced profession prospects for the scholars on the profitable groups.
The FPA Monetary Planning Problem serves as a pure experiment to establish probably the most profitable school packages making ready undergraduate college students for careers in monetary planning. Aggregated over a decade, the Monetary Planning Problem outcomes yield a dataset that shows outstanding validity.
The Three Phases of the FPA Monetary Planning Problem
Now in its 14th yr, the FPA Monetary Planning Problem competitors is tailor-made for undergraduate monetary planning diploma packages at faculties and universities registered with the CFP Board. Three rigorous phases make up the Monetary Planning Problem.
Within the first part, the FPA publishes an in depth case examine profiling two hypothetical purchasers. Pupil groups put together a complete monetary plan based mostly on the particulars of the case they choose. That is the form of monetary planning doc that each advisor prepares each day. Then, the FPA judges the standard of the plans and advances the eight school groups which have ready probably the most skilled plans. The eight groups who submitted probably the most excellent plans are invited to the subsequent phases of the competitors which occur on the FPA’s nationwide convention.
In Part 2, the finalist groups orally current the plan earlier than impartial monetary planners, very similar to advisors current plans to real-world purchasers. The groups are judged on each the rigor of the content material and the standard of the presentation. Phases 1 and a couple of mirror the CFP Board’s Monetary Plan Improvement (Capstone) Course necessities.
In Part 3, the groups compete in a recreation show-style monetary planning information contest referred to as “How Do You Know?” that checks particular information in areas akin to property planning, insurance coverage and taxation. The workforce that buzzes within the quickest with the precise reply wins factors. Are You Smarter than a School Monetary Planning Pupil? provides readers a way of the questions the scholar groups face.
The High Eight Universities for Monetary Planning
Primarily based on the mixture outcomes of the Monetary Planning Affiliation’s Monetary Planning Problem from 2010-2023, the eight highest performing undergraduate monetary planning packages are:
- Kansas State College
- Texas Tech College
- Utah Valley College
- Fort Hays College
- College of Georgia
- Virginia Tech College
- Texas A&M College
- William Paterson College
Over time, there was a outstanding consistency within the faculties represented by the groups advancing groups to the ultimate eight. For instance, previously 13 years, each Kansas State College and Texas Tech College boasted 11 finalists. Utah Valley College groups superior to the finals eight instances.
Methodology
We recognized the finalists of the Monetary Planning Problem from 2010 to 2023 utilizing information submitted by the FPA. To find out the general rankings of faculties, we awarded 30 factors for each first-place end, 20 factors for each second-place end, and 10 factors for each third-place end. As well as, we awarded 5 factors to each school which fielded a workforce that reached the finals, even when the workforce didn’t safe a first-, second- or third-place place. The outcomes are summarized in Determine 2.
As an extra validation of the information, we made an analogous calculation, considering solely the outcomes of even years and odd years. We took this step to regulate for the distorting impact that is perhaps brought on by a school fielding the identical distinctive workforce over two or extra years of the competitors. When the calculations use solely outcomes from even years of the competitors, the outcomes match up precisely with the information set as an entire. Equally, outcomes from odd years mirror the information set as an entire.
Additional, WealthManagement.com thought-about how quite a few indicators related to rating school packages might have predicted the outcomes of the competitors. These indicators embody: variety of monetary planning programs accessible, variety of school (full-time equivalents), variety of undergraduate college students, admission fee (calculated by dividing the variety of accepted college students by the overall quantity that utilized), completion fee (share of scholars who begin a level program and are in a position to full it, both on-time (4 years for a BA diploma) or on a delayed foundation (six years)), placement fee (greater placement charges recommend that the college supplies invaluable profession preparation and networking alternatives), tuition and charges (decrease tuition prices contribute to the next ROI by permitting them to recoup their funding extra rapidly by earnings).
Trying to find the Secret Sauce
What makes the top-performing monetary planning packages so constantly profitable? Inspection of inputs such because the variety of lessons, the variety of school, enrollment, admission fee or completion fee fails to disclose any benefit. Nor does school tuition correlate with success.
One metric appears vital: All the top-performing faculties are public establishments. On condition that roughly half of the 179 faculties registered with the CFP Board are personal faculties, the truth that the top-performing faculties are all public establishments stands out. Maybe public faculties are inclined to have bigger enrollments, thus growing the pool of expertise monetary planning groups can draw on.
A correlated issue is that schools that supply superior levels in monetary planning (MS and Ph.D.) additionally are inclined to outperform faculties that supply solely BS levels. Public faculties have a tendency to supply extra graduate packages than personal faculties. In the long run, we consider it’s doubtless that the sources of public establishments have an outsize influence on success. Doubtless vital, though unattainable to measure, is the dedication and dedication of the school assigned to be the educational advisor of every workforce.
The High-Ranked Packages
All the accredited monetary planning ranked by WealthManagement.com are high quality packages targeted on making ready candidates for the CFP examination. The highest-ranked packages usually show a mixture of the next standards: a excessive variety of completions reported to the CFP Board; excessive retention, commencement, and pass-fail charges; and a excessive ratio of college who’ve earned CFP credentials.
Conclusion
The worth of training is more and more scrutinized, and potential college students usually grapple with the daunting job of choosing the school program that unlocks probably the most worth as they put together for careers in monetary planning. The choice is not nearly educational rigor or campus life—it is also in regards to the return on funding (ROI).
John Kador is a enterprise creator and frequent contributor to Wealth Administration. He’s based mostly in Winfield, PA. Katie Tschida, a registered affiliate on the West Coast workplace of a nationwide impartial dealer supplier, is pursuing a graduate diploma in wealth administration at Columbia College.
