The plastic card is not the best choice.

Time Money reports.

Why Bank Accounts Are Better Than Credit Cards for College Kids

If you want your college student to learn money management skills, get him or her a checkbook instead of a credit card.

In fact, a recent survey of 42,000 first-year college students found that the earlier teenagers had access to credit cards, the less prepared they felt for managing their own money in college.

Those who had checking accounts, by contrast, were “markedly more prepared” to handle their finances than those who were unbanked before college, according to the study conducted by education technology company EverFi and sponsored by financial services company Higher One.

The findings match up with the experience of Janet Bodnar. The editor of Kiplinger’s Personal Finance and mother of three college graduates sees credit cards for college students as dangerous and unnecessary.

Young people need to have finite amounts of money to learn essential skills such as budgeting and monitoring their accounts, said Bodnar, author of the book “Raising Money Smart Kids.”