PennyJar Initiative brings financial literacy to students
By Danijela Marcinkovic, March 24 2026—
The PennyJar Initiative is hosting two upcoming events for students interested in building confidence in the realm of finances and the Gauntlet interviewed Co-President Sejal Chikhale, who provided insights into these events and discussed the PennyJar Initiative’s purpose.
On April 1, a session on “Taxes with CRA” will be held online via Microsoft Teams. At this event, Bonnie McIntyre from the CRA will be covering the basics of filing taxes in Canada and sharing resources that can help students. Topics being discussed in this event include: Canadian tax basics, key tax credits and government benefits students often miss, filing taxes and important deadlines and where to access free tax help.
This event is free of charge and will run from 4:30-6:00 p.m. MST. Registration can be done at: https://luma.com/0e2ue09o.
“What’s amazing is the session is catered [towards] beginners to intermediates, so basically anybody who works has to file their taxes, and many international students or those coming in who don’t even work have to still file taxes. So I think this is an excellent session where you get to understand the basics,” Chikhale said.
Chikhale noted that this event is for anybody seeking tax help, not just university students.
“This is also Canada wide, so we’ve been promoting it across the country,” she said.
On March 31, a panel discussion will be held in-person at the Collision Space (HNSC 401) at the University of Calgary. This panel event includes professionals from finance and academia, who will be sharing insights on investing, followed by a Q&A and networking.
This event is ticketed, early bird tickets are $6 (until March 25) and late tickets are $10. Registration can be done at: https://luma.com/pzv9uav3.
Chikhale discussed the uniqueness of this event, and how students can benefit from attending.
“We bring in finance professionals from different niches…and we allow students to ask any questions they want to,” she said. “Right now we have a really interesting panel. We have a finance professor from Haskayne School of Business…we have one from Private Wealth, we have someone who’s also a financial planner.”
Chikhale mentioned that this event had occurred once before, but this time they have included a small cost in order to provide refreshments for those attending.
“This time we started to put a little bit of a charge so that we could bring better food and drinks for folks and provide them with a better experience,” she said.
Chikhale also mentioned that if students are not comfortable with asking questions publicly during the event, the option to ask questions on a mentimeter is available.
The Gauntlet asked if people have benefitted from such events, and Chikhale responded with a personal experience.
“I have to say one of my first biggest success stories is myself. I am a cell biology major, but right now I’m working in corporate in Toronto, so I moved into the financial industry myself,” she said. “I think PennyJar Initiative was the base of it, it was the networks I built which helped me change my career journey completely.”
Chikhale also mentioned that the PennyJar Initiative recently launched a feedback form, through which they have received many positive reviews of their events.
The PennyJar Initiative is also not sponsored, allowing them to only promote unbiased views.
“We don’t take sponsorship from banks, so they don’t get to promote themselves,” she said.
PennyJar Initiative also has more events in the works to further employ financial literacy.
“We’re planning to start…virtual coffee chat sessions,” Chikhale said. “These are gonna be for…a small size of 20 people, and they get to have one on one…group sessions with a person.”
PennyJar Initiative launched in September 2024, and is continuing to grow. They want to remain unbiased and unsponsored, and are on the road to becoming an official Canada wide nonprofit organization.
More information on the PennyJar Initiative can be found via their LinkTree.