Although 45 states include a financial curriculum in their standards, only 19 require students to take such classes, according to the survey.
There is some evidence that mandating personal finance courses in high school works. Students required to study the topic boasted better credit scores and lower debt delinquency rates as young adults, according to a 2014 study from researchers at the Federal Reserve.
Advocates say the quality of the curriculum matters, as well as whether the person teaching the course has been properly trained to teach it.
In the Experian survey, many respondents had unanswered questions about personal finance, regardless of whether they took a course in high school.
However, there was a difference in the topics that each group wants to know more about. For example, the 36% who have had a class were most interested in taxes, while the 64% who’d had no classes wanted mostly to know more about how to save money.
Also, 38% of the survey respondents said they find personal finance topics to be somewhat interesting and 11% love learning about them. Still, another 40% have no strong feelings one way or the other, and the rest agreed with the statement, “They are a snooze and bore me.”