Dropouts Seek a Boost From Equivalency Exams

Wall Street Journal ^ | Sept 12, 2009 | S. MITRA KALITA

[Kevmo]

Dropouts Seek a Boost From Equivalency Exams

Numbers Seeking a Degree Swell -- But Gains May Be Limited

A growing number of Americans are taking high school equivalency tests in their hunt for any leg up in a bleak labor market.

Adult-education centers across the country report backlogs and waiting lists for prep courses cramming dozens of topics and years of lessons into weeks or months. But the potential for a better job and pay that drives many to seek a General Educational Development diploma comes with a caveat: The certificate generally is of limited value unless students use it as a stepping-stone to further education.

Studying for the GEDs View Slideshow

Lee Celano for The Wall Street Journal

Roger McCoy worked on an essay in Garyville, La., Thursday.

More photos and interactive graphics In 2008, the number of people taking the test for their GED diploma grew 6.6% to 777,000 from a year earlier, according to the American Council on Education, which administers the test. Between the first quarters of 2008 and 2009, three states -- Louisiana, New Hampshire and North Carolina -- and the District of Columbia saw at least a 20% rise in the number of test-takers.

....

[Kevmo]

"The GED's primary value is as a gateway to obtaining more valuable postsecondary training," said James J. Heckman, a University of Chicago economist and Nobel laureate.

[Kevmo]

Here’s my modest proposal for education reform.

We have been discussing ways to fast track kids through high school to avoid the liberal agenda and other idiocies:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1315730/posts?page=84#84

Proposal for the Free Republic High School Diploma.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1316882/posts

[NappyOne]

It is discouraging to read that those with GED are only slightly better off than drop outs. If I were in the market to employ basic labor that did not require college, I would be interested in the individual who, once making the error of dropping out of high school, turned their lives around and got thing going with again with a GED. It would seem to show some real initiative and focus that those who are deemed by the NEA to have achieved at a level to receive a high school diploma too often lack. I also perceive, from reading this, that passing the GED test may require more actual knowledge and understanding of math, reading and science than getting the NEA blessed diploma.

Back in the 1970s a GED was stigmatized as second rate to a real diploma. Back then a high school diploma meant something. I actually got one “F” and had to redo the course in summer school to make it up. Who gets an “F” in high school these days? Seems the stigma of a GED is still there in the face of a possibly higher GED standard of leaning caused by the inflation of the NEA crafted modern high school diploma.

The NappyOne

[altair]

If I were in the market to employ basic labor that did not require college, I would be interested in the individual who, once making the error of dropping out of high school, turned their lives around and got thing going with again with a GED.

Bump.