San Diego State University and The College For Financial Planning Recognized for Excellence

Chris, Ellen and I were gratified to learn that both San Diego State University and The College for Financial Planning were named as two of 10 standout financial planning educational schools. Chris and Ellen are both graduates of SDSU and I am a graduate of The College for Financial Planning.

Both Chris and Ellen know the founder of the SDSU program, Tom Warschauer, very well. When Tom started the financial planning programs in 1980 - he wanted to see a business school treat personal financial planning as a subject just as important and worthy of study as corporate finance.

"One of the reasons I came here is that they would allow me to start a personal financial planning program in a business school," Warschauer says. More specifically, he wanted a business school accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, probably the most widely respected accrediting agency for business studies.

When I studied financial planning in the mid 1980"s, financial planning education was still in it"s infancy.

The College for Financial Planning, founded in 1972, is where CFP education was born - in fact, in the early years, the college owned the designation. When founders Lew Kearns and James R. Johnston started the school, there were no other educational programs devoted exclusively to financial planning, there were no textbooks and there was no established curriculum or certifying exam.

Even though we all received an excellent initial education, it is our serious commitment to continuing education that keeps us sharp. In fact, our firm has internal continuing education requirements that are far higher than what is required by the CFP Board of Standards.

We require each professional to spend two hours a week on continuing education, and one hour a week on increasing their software technology skills. This results in over 100 hours of continuing education per year per professional advisor.