New GED Exam Is Causing Testiness

A revamped version of the national high school equivalency exam that tens of thousands of Californians take each year is making its debut across the state, bringing anxiety over its difficulty, new testing procedures and scoring delays, adult-school officials say.

The General Educational Development, or GED, exam is designed to give adults who never completed high school another shot at earning their diplomas. For the first time since 1988 and only the third time in its 60-year history, the test was revised this year to keep up with evolving high school graduation requirements and the demands of the modern workplace.

“It certainly is different, very different, but it’s also harder by design,” said Lyn Schaefer, director of test development for the GED Testing Service at the American Council on Education, the private organization that administers the exam.

“The knowledge that just about every state was evaluating their graduation standards prompted us to look at the [old] test and ask, ‘How well does this match up with what high school students are going to be doing in the 21st century?’”

Oxnard resident Daniel Govea, 25, knows that the GED test he plans to take later this month is more rigorous than the one he would have faced 11 weeks ago.

Seven years after he dropped out of high school in the last semester of his senior year, however, and with the promise of a $2-an-hour-raise at the optician’s shop where he works if he passes, Govea is determined to keep studying until he has a GED certificate.

“It would have been easier to pass before, but I’m pretty confident that I’ll still be able to pass it,” said Govea. “What I really wish is that I would have just graduated from high school.”

Nancy Edmunds, associate analyst for the California GED Office, said it is too early to say what effect the harder exam is having on passing rates. Preliminary results show that test-takers are struggling the most with the math and writing portions, just as they did with the old test, she said.

So far, the main problem the new test has created is a scoring backlog that has increased the amount of time test-takers have to wait for their results--and, if they passed, their diplomas--from about two weeks to a month or longer.

New Scoring System Is Delaying Results

In the past, testing sites were permitted to do some preliminary scoring on their own. But when the new test was launched, the state simultaneously moved to a centralized scoring system that has slowed down an information pipeline that was already overtaxed, Edmunds said.

She said state officials are working to speed up the processing of scores and, in certain emergency situations, have been able to give candidates whose futures rest on whether they pass the GED at least verbal confirmation on their standing.

“In some cases, it can mean the difference between financial aid or not, and it can mean the difference between getting a job or not,” Edmunds said.

“For the person taking the exam, it means whether they can get on with their life, or if they are going to be stuck where they are.”

The most radical change in the test, or at least the one that is causing the most apprehension, is the move to a two-part math section that places a much greater emphasis on algebra. On the first half, students may use a scientific calculator, a tool that has never been permitted before, and one-fifth of the math questions requires them to write in the correct response instead of selecting a multiple-choice answer.

Other updates include a shift toward questions that assess both practical knowledge and analytical ability. On the nonfiction section of the reading test, for example, students are more likely to find a job training manual than a theater review, while everyday items such as recipes and nutritional content labels form the basis of word problems on the math segment.

In addition, the essay portion has taken on more weight in the overall scoring of the test.

Although the overhauled exam became effective Jan. 14, most testing sites throughout Southern California have only recently started administering it. The Los Angeles Unified School District, for instance, which operates the state’s largest GED testing center at a facility downtown, offered it for the first time in late February. The Simi Valley Adult School has scheduled its first testing session for late March.

Edmunds, of the state GED Office, said difficulty in obtaining student workbooks, practice tests and other preparation materials has forced many adult schools to postpone their initial testing dates.

“Teachers and agencies that are preparing people for the test really felt like they didn’t have the materials necessary to get them ready,” Edmunds said, adding that the materials became widely available only in early February.

According to adult-school officials, the delays have not created huge backlogs of thwarted test-takers, in part because so many people opted to take the old GED exam before it was retired on Dec. 31. Edmunds estimates that close to 70,000 people took the GED in California last year, a 20% jump over the number of test-takers in 2000.

The rush of candidates was prompted by the GED Testing Service’s announcement that test-takers who may have passed one or more sections of the old test wouldn’t be permitted to roll over their scores once the new exam was introduced.

Coupled with publicity over the new test’s increased rigor, virtually every test site in the region saw a flurry of last-minute test-takers.

“We sent out letters starting in June to anybody who has taken the GED with us during the last 10 years, and in September we had this huge rush,” said Linda Sugino, GED testing examiner at the Oxnard Adult School. “I was testing almost every day through November and December, and we had full houses every night.”

As they have introduced the new exam, some sites have opted to reduce the number of test-takers they will accommodate at one time.

Spreading 7 1/2-Hour Test Over 2 or More Days

Last year, for instance, L.A. Unified’s testing center offered the GED to groups of 40 to 50 people. For its first several testing sessions, the center is limiting its candidate pool to half that many, mostly to give examiners a chance to become familiar with the new format, said chief GED examiner Ann Jackson. Some test sites, including the downtown Los Angeles site, have started spreading the 7 1/2-hour test over two or more days.

Bill Macri, chief GED examiner at the Simi Valley Adult School, said an eight-page pre-test demographic survey that the GED Testing Service is requiring for research purposes made it less feasible to allow test-takers to complete the entire battery in one sitting.

“We think it is too much to do in one day for the students,” Macri said.

Officials at schools that have gained some experience with the new test say the switch has gone smoothly.

Sugino, of the Oxnard Adult School, recently received her first round of scores and said she was pleasantly surprised by the results, which were comparable to those for the old test.

“I was a bit leery because of the new testing form,” Sugino said. “But they did well, better than I was expecting.”