Job insecurities, rampant consumer debt and a troubled mortgage and real estate market all add stress to an already emotional and often taboo subject:  money.  Each person experiences the financial world through the filter of his/her own family of origin patterns, peer culture, gender constructs and unique neurobiology. Couples often find themselves more in conflict over money than any other subject. Facts are often tangled up with feelings about the facts.  An abstract concept, money serves as a canvas on which individuals project self-concept, hopes, values and beliefs.

Learning Objectives:

1. Recognize that financial illiteracy is widespread and understand the ways in which lack of financial knowledge can adversely impact individuals.

2. Identify the many interacting factors – social, biological, historical, and financial that contribute to the development of an individual’s financial personality.

3. Be able to explain why financial wellbeing is as important to a family’s health as physical, mental, social and emotional wellbeing.

4. Gain an understanding of how opposing financial personalities and polar minds (methodical vs impulsive) can affect quality of interpersonal relationships, and understand key challenges facing people in such opposite relationships.

5. Consider the implications of financial personality and type of mind for social work practice with individuals and families seeking assistance with their finances.

Faculty:

Connie Kilmark

Ms. Kilmark has created an original approach to financial issues, balancing technical aspects of finances with sensitivity to the emotional and psychological dynamics.  An experienced couple’s counselor for over thirty years, Ms. Kilmark sees clients at every stage of money conflict, up to and including divorce. As director of the Madison Consumer Credit Counseling Service from 1976 through 1987, Ms. Kilmark supervised yearlong field placements for second year Masters candidates from the UW School of Social Work.  In full time private practice, Ms. Kilmark divides her time between private counseling, speaking and teaching in professional development conferences.