Effective buymanship and effective financial management are the cornerstone of an elementary and secondary school consumer education program. The curriculum must meet some basic and essential criteria in order to prepare the student for learning about budgeting, a concept which encompasses buymanship and financial management. Through knowledge, insights, and attitudes, students can be helped toward a rich image of the personal and family life they want to work toward, the values they mean to live by, and the commitments they will not forsake; toward a working familiarity with their economic system; and toward a working acquaintanceship with the processes of government and a social philosophy. The tone of a course is important in determining how the students see their own lives; each teacher must decide what type of attitude towards consumerism he wishes to encourage. Preliminary steps to program organization are described: (1) lay out the total job; (2) take an inventory of consumer education already being done in each department; (3) find simple adaptations to enrich the total program. In a well-rounded school-wide program, the special consumer education course starts where other programs have left off, and drives deeper. (Author/AJ)