The GED test - a battery of exams that measure mastery of high school course work for those who haven’t completed high school - is all new for 2014.
The first national remake since 2002 means big changes for the thousands of Arkansans who annually take what is officially titled the General Educational Development test.
The five-section test has now been trimmed to four sections. The new version will be administered only on computers at state-authorized adult-education centers and testing centers. The official test is not available online for someone to take at home.
It will be graded, and the results reported to the test-taker, on the same day the test is taken.
Most notably, the new version will now cost the Arkansas test-taker $16, an amount recently approved by the Arkansas Board of Career Education but still subject to review by a legislative Rules and Regulations Committee.
The test was previously free to students in Arkansas. It actually costs $120 for the test and its delivery.
“We have enough funding this calendar year, January 1 to December 31, to cover the GED costs, including the $16 that each person will pay for the assessment,” said James H. Smith Jr., the Arkansas Department of Career Education’s deputy director for adult education.
“We’ve taken every penny that we can find in savings, and we’re applying it to the cost of the assessment this year.”
Gov. Mike Beebe has plans to help the agency cobble together the money to absorb most of the testing costs.
“The governor is going to request $450,000 in state rainy-day funds to be dedicated toward that,” Matt DeCample, the governor’s spokesman, said Friday. The request to use the state surplus money will have to go through the legislative Joint Performance Review Committee next month, he said.
Smith said minimizing the cost to test-takers will prove to be an economic benefit to the state in the long run.
“It’s an Arkansas statistic that a person who passes the GED and earns the Arkansas High School diploma earns an average $8,000 a year more in salary,” Smith said.
“It’s economic, and then it’s educational,” he said. “I call the GED test the footstool to success in post-secondary education. That post-secondary education can be a vocational certificate, or an associate degree or some apprenticeship program. All require at least two years beyond high school.”
The same GED test is given nationwide, but its management and the fee charged to the test-taker vary by state.
In Arkansas, the state’s Department of Career Education and Board of Career Education oversee the program and the testing done at GED testing centers around the state.
In 2012, the most recent year for which there is complete data, there were 7,763 GED test-takers in Arkansas, said Janice Hanlon, state administrator for the GED Testing Program. The numbers were even higher in the four previous years, with the highest in 2010 at 8,783.
Eligible to take the GED test are people 16 years old or older who are not enrolled in high school and who have not graduated from high school. Youths ages 16 and 17 must be formally released from their school districts before they can take the GED test because state law requires them to attend school through age 17.
Over the past five years, Arkansas’ annual pass rate was 84 percent or better, Hanlon said. Arkansas requires candidates for the GED test to first take and pass the GED practice test.
Passing the practice test will remain a requirement for the new GED exam, Hanlon said. The practice test must be done at an authorized testing center in order for it to count, she said.
Questions on the new exam are based on the new Common Core State Standards in math and English/ language arts that have been adopted by Arkansas and most other states in recent years.
The new Common Core education standards for kindergarten through 12th grades have made it necessary to revise the GED test.
This is the final school year for the Arkansas Augmented Benchmark and End-of-Course exams in the public schools. Those tests will be replaced in 2014-15 with exams developed by a consortium of states known as the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers.
The revised GED test has four sections: reasoning through language arts, mathematical reasoning, science and social studies.
A test-taker can choose to take just a portion of what is a seven-hour test or take the entire thing, Hanlon said. The test-taker can take a practice test in science and then take the science exam, for example. Previously, the test-taker had to pass the whole practice test and then take the whole test.
“They can really study one area at a time,” Hanlon said with the new test. “That will be an advantage to the student.”
Previously, GED test-takers had to wait two to three weeks for their test results - and all they received was their score. Under the revisions, the test will be scored on the same day a student takes it, Hanlon said, and the score report will detail the areas or skills in which the test-taker must work if he did not pass parts or all of the exam.
One disadvantage is that people who have passed sections of the old test but did not pass all parts will have to start over with the new test. The credit they had for passing parts of the exam expires this year.
Hanlon said the adult education centers and GED testing centers, which are not always the same locations, had to acquire computers and supporting technology in preparation for giving the new tests.
“Some centers had enough computers, but we wanted to get all new computers,” said Blake Robertson, director of adult education at the College of the Ouachitas in Malvern.
At the Malvern center, that meant 20 new computers and installation of a glass wall in a classroom to allow the test proctor to oversee administration of the test.
Three additional computers and cameras were purchased for a satellite adult education center in Sheridan, Robertson said. The cameras will allow the proctor to watch the test-takers on his computer.
Adult education program leaders said in recent interviews that they can’t predict how the new test will affect the number of GED test-takers this year.
“We may not have as high a pass rate this first year because the test may take some getting used to,” Hanlon said in reference to the changed education standards. “The kinds of questions may be a little bit different, but then I always say math is math.”
Smith said the fact that the new test will be given on a computer creates some uncertainty about the expected turnout for taking the test and the pass rate. The adult education centers are teaching their students the computer skills necessary to take the exam, if the students don’t have them.
Successful test-takers will have to know how to use drop-down boxes, and how to drag and drop blocks of text. There are two questions on the exam that require an extended response, so test-takers must be comfortable enough with the computer keyboard to type a few paragraphs.
“By the test being on the computer, it’s a mixed bag,” Smith said. “The ones who live in that world are elated by it. Those who are new to that world have an innate fear of it. It can be overcome because we teach them that the computer is a tool that is no different than a pen.”
Robertson said the impact of the $16 fee is unknown.
“We are hoping people will say, ‘This is just something I need. Just as I buy food, cigarettes and clothes, I need to purchase the test.’ We are going into it with a positive attitude.”
More information about the locations of adult education centers and GED testing centers is available by calling (501) 682-1980 in Little Rock during regular business hours. Finding a nearby adult education center or signing up for the test can be done online by creating an account on ged.com.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/30/2013