Saskatchewan's Minister of Education was in Humboldt and St. Brieux Monday for a pair of appearances.

In the afternoon, Don Morgan was at the Humboldt Public School sitting in with the grade seven class during the Dollars with Sense program being taught to them.

Morgan explains that program has been in place since the 1990's in part with the non-profit group called Junior Achievement.

He outlined the importance of financial know-how.

"How much it would cost for them to live, how they would want to live, what rent was, what a mortgage was, and then how much they would have to earn to maintain that lifestyle so most of them it became an eye-opener because a lot of them had large ideas of what they would like to have for a car or a home."

Morgan added over his time as Minister parents were passionate about more real life teaching for things such as income taxes and how a mortgage works.

"We hear from parents, we hear from business people all the time, you have to do more at teaching kids financial literacy. Kids need to understand how the economy works, how the province works so it's programs like this that people will see hands on."

"It will give them incentive to stay in school," Morgan added. "They will realize the tie between education and what they will earn later in life so it's a good point for them to do it."

Morgan was also in St. Brieux to celebrate the sod turning of an $8 million dollar expansion and renovation project at the school there. Morgan says they want to continue with upgrades in rural areas showing growth.

"We're watching what is taking place in rural Saskatchewan because with the growth in the economy in the last few years we're seeing communities like Humboldt and St. Brieux that have seen significant growth. We're no longer closing schools, we're looking at adding on, putting on portables which is great to see."

Once completed in June of 2017, the school will have three new classrooms, Industrial Arts lab, Practical and Applied Arts space, cooking and clothing lab, new washrooms, and the expansion of the library and main entrance.

You can hear more from Morgan in his interview with Bolt FM's Clark Stork and the Humboldt Journal's Becky Zimmer below.