When you hear the words “home economics,” if you think more 1950s sewing than 21^st century financial savvy, you and your children may be missing the boat.

While changes over the past decade have brought more business and personal finance instruction into middle schools and high schools across the country, only a handful of states consider these courses mandatory--and experts say that’s not enough.

FOXBusiness.com tackles education as our “On Topic” for September. Check back every day to read stories about trends, concerns and analysis, at the K-12 level as well as in higher education.

It’s no secret that teen spending power is on the rise. But while they may be spending more, there’s evidence that teenagers seem to be understanding less when it comes to their finances.

The Jump$tart Coalition for Personal Finance Literacy, which aims to improve the financial curriculums of students across the country, releases a national survey every two years that tests the financial comprehension of nearly 7,000 high school seniors. This year’s results showed a decline from the survey prior, with the average student answering only 48.3%--less than half--of the questions correctly.

For those in the industry, that figure underscores the lack of strong financial instruction available for young people.

“It’s like giving every kid a brand-new car on their 16^th birthday, but no driver’s license,” said Jason Alderman, director of financial education at Visa. “[There are] a lot of financial wrecks out there.”

Some argue financial education is out there for the taking, but it’s just too little too late. Jump$tart believes basic money-management concepts should begin in kindergarten.

“Start early. That’s when opinion and habits are formed,” said Laura Levine, executive director of the coalition, who argues that those who try to introduce these concepts to older age groups have the added challenge of getting through to a more skeptical audience.

One of the biggest hurdles in the effort to bring business into the classroom is that there’s just not enough time in the day or room in the budget to do it.

“When you try to get this education into a school day that is already too crowded, with school resources already stretched too thin, that’s where you end up with a challenge,” Levine said.

Still, schools try to make do with what they have to offer their students a taste of the business world. Sixth-grade students in the Smithtown Central School District in Smithtown, N.Y. do a unit in personal finance as part of their required Family and Consumer Science curriculum (what used to be called “home economics”). For their final project, students are given jobs and incomes, and must successfully develop budgets to manage their rent, car payments, groceries and discretionary purchases.

The lessons may be for the students, but the message applies to the teachers as well.

“Budget has definitely affected what we do, but we are, in a sense, trying to do what we teach the kids about--we’re trying to economize,” said Dianne Elmore, the district’s career and technical education chair.

At Smithtown’s high schools and in most other high schools across the country, business classes at the high school level make it into the schedule as electives. According to a 2007 survey by the National Council on Economic Education, only 17 states nationwide require students to take an economics course to graduate. When it comes to personal finance, the numbers are smaller: only seven states require students to take a personal finance course to graduate, according to the survey.

In addition, just because more practical life skills and business classes are offered doesn’t mean students will be inclined to take them.

“Unfortunately, there’s still a little bit of a stigma that kids who are college-bound don’t take [family and consumer science classes],” said Levine. According to the experts, students focused on fulfilling the requirements that will get them into their dream school may not be as likely to take an elective that doesn’t complement their focus.

The stigma surrounding family and consumer science classes is also negatively impacted by the lack of standardized testing in the subject area.

“It’s not looked upon as having much value because there is no test,” said Elmore of the Smithtown Central School District

Still, some schools are working to make their elective business courses attractive to students. At Winnacunnet High School in New Hampshire, one of the latest states to enact an economics course requirement, business courses are in high demand, said Janice Arsenault, one of the school’s business teachers.

“We have a very strong business education program, and I think what builds strength is that we have so many kids signing up take these classes,” Arsenault said.

Some of the courses are now weighted as honors classes in students’ grade-point averages, a perk that doesn’t apply to most other elective areas of study within the school’s curriculum and may have helped boost students’ incentive to take classes within the program.

“Many kids come to me and say, ‘I’d love to take accounting. I’m going to college for business, but I need to have it count towards my college rank.’ Now it does,” Arsenault said.

Finally, for those not inclined to take a practical skills class under the simple assumption that business is boring, there are options.

Alderman at Visa (V) encourages teachers to bring business topics into other courses like math and English to maximize students’ exposure without necessarily having to drill it into them. He also believes in an education-meets-entertainment philosophy.

In just one example, Alderman’s team at Visa teamed up with the NFL to create Financial Football, a Web-based quiz-style game teachers can use to help their students learn while having fun.