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The purpose of the GED Tests, as currently formatted, is "to provide an opportunity for adults who have not graduated from high school to earn a high-school level educational diploma" by demonstrating "the attainment of developed abilities normally acquired through completion of a high school program of study....The credential provided by passing the GED may be used in a manner identical to a high school diploma" (GED Testing Service 1993a).
The GED Testing Service ordinarily refers to those who pass the exam as "graduates," and the credential they earn is called a "diploma" or sometimes, more explicitly, a "high school diploma."[1] Through much of its history, the GED has been described as a high school equivalency credential,[2] and it is formally regarded as such by most states and many federal programs. GED recipients are typically counted as high school graduates in statistics of state and local educational systems and in those of federal agencies such as the Bureau of the Census.
It is reasonable, then, to ask how well GED recipients perform, compared to high school graduates, in arenas such as postsecondary education, the labor market, and the military; and many researchers have done so. Further, because the GED Tests are intended to increase opportunity for those who have not completed high school, it is also important to ask how well GED recipients perform, compared to other dropouts. Where there are differences in either comparison, it will be useful to determine, where possible, how much of a given difference is due to the GED and how much to other factors, such as socioeconomic background and individual characteristics not measured by the tests.
This study synthesizes a half century of research that addresses these and related questions. It describes the development and characteristics of the tests and the challenges that have been raised to them; discusses the functions of the GED process; and examines the performance of GED recipients in postsecondary education, the civilian labor market, and the military.
The GED Tests were developed in the early 1940s, when the United States was entering World War II. At the time, many service members did not have high school diplomas, either because they had left school to join the armed forces or because they had left for other reasons and later joined the military. The Roosevelt administration favored federal support for the college education of returning veterans (Quinn 1997a). However, lacking high school diplomas, these service members would not have been able to enter college without some special arrangements. After World War I, high school diplomas had often been granted for wartime service. Postsecondary institutions also had granted college credit for service in the military. Over time, though, colleges and universities came to oppose this practice, and, as an alternative, the American Council on Education (ACE) proposed testing veterans to determine competence for college.
In 1942, members of an Advisory Committee to the Army Institute, including Ralph Tyler and Everett Lindquist, selected five tests from the Iowa Test of Educational Development to form the first General Educational Development Tests. Tyler and Lindquist were proponents of progressive education, which emphasized the integration of learning with everyday life and de-emphasized formal academic learning that apparently had little practical application (Quinn 1997a). The Iowa Test, and the new GED Tests, reflected this orientation. In part, the exams emphasized reading and interpreting passages in the social sciences, natural sciences, and literature. Lindquist explained that
there are many different kinds of situations in which a person has occasion to use his education, but that which lends itself most readily to testing is the reading situation that in which he interprets, evaluates critically, and employs in his own thinking, ideas and information which are presented to him in print (quoted in Quinn 1997a, p. 31).
The emphasis on using learning in everyday life was also evident in the math test, which, according to Lindquist, measured
the ability to deal with numbers, [including]... such things as estimating expenses on home repairs, handling simple business transactions, figuring out costs on your own insurance, taxes, investments, installment purchases, and so on (quoted in Quinn 1997a, p. 31).
The GED Tests were first administered to veterans and service members in 1943.[3] Initially, colleges and universities were the primary users of the test results, employing them in the admissions process. After the war, the GED battery was also administered to civilians, and states began to grant high school credentials to those who passed. By 1959, civilian test takers outnumbered veterans and service members.[4]
Use of the GED has expanded tremendously since the tests were first introduced. In 1995, 503,813 GED credentials were issued in the United States, as were 2,553,000 regular high school diplomas. GEDs accounted for one-sixth of the combined total in that year. Not only has the number of GED credentials increased, the GED share of secondary credentials has grown as well. In 1968, 5 percent of high school credentials were equivalency certificates--mostly GEDs. By 1987, the proportion had risen to more than 14 percent (Cameron and Heckman 1993), and in 1995 it had reached 16 percent. Among younger people, in 1989 GEDs made up 4.2 percent of secondary credentials held by those in the 18_24 age range; by 1995, the proportion had increased to 7.7 percent.[5]
Table 1 shows the number of test batteries administered in the U.S., its territories, and Canada from 1954 to 1973, and the number of people completing the tests from 1974 through 1995, together with the percentage who passed.[6]
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The number of GED Tests administered rose from a few thousand in the early years to more than 100,000 in 1964 and to 440,000 in 1973. Marked increases in test administration beginning in the mid-1960s paralleled the expansion of federal education initiatives. Adult literacy programs, such as those established by the Adult Basic Education Act of 1966, encouraged and prepared participants to take the GED. Pell Grants and Supplementary Educational Opportunity Grants required recipients to be students at approved postsecondary education or training institutions and to demonstrate a need for financial aid and an ability to benefit from it. The U.S. Department of Education uses GED certification as one way to demonstrate ability to benefit. While a causal link between the expansion in federal education programs and accelerated growth in GED completions has not been established, such a link is plausible (Cameron and Heckman 1993). By 1980, almost three quarters of a million individuals were completing the tests. GED test taking slackened after that, but a recent rise brought the number completing the tests to 724,000 in 1995.
During and after World War II, the GED pass rates were very high. According to the Veterans Testing Service, for example, in the first years of the program, some 92 percent of veterans who took the GED passed it, and local data in 1945 and 1946 showed pass rates around 86 percent (Quinn 1997a). By the 1950s the rates were somewhat lower, but substantial majorities of examinees still passed the tests. Between 1974 and 1995 the median yearly pass rate was 71.5 percent.
The eventual pass rates for first-time test takers are not necessarily evident from table 1, because individuals may take the GED exam more than once. Though practices vary by state, examinees who fail to complete one or more of the five tests the first time usually need only retake those tests, not the entire battery. The rate of test retaking has increased. About 7 percent of tests administered in 1958 were retaken, as compared to about 13 percent of tests completed in 1995 (Veteran's Testing Service n.d., GED Testing Service 1996a).[7]
Two studies have examined the longer-term pass rates for cohorts of examinees. Cervero (1983) reported that 71 percent of examinees surveyed in spring 1980 passed the tests at the time they took it. Responses to his fall 1981 follow-up survey indicated that an additional 15 percent had passed the tests in the 18 months since the first survey. In all, 86 percent of the 1980 test takers in the sample had passed by 1982. Kroll and Qi (1995) noted that 66 percent of those who completed the tests in the United States and its territories in 1989 were awarded credentials.[8] In their 1992 follow-up survey, an additional 9 percent75 percent in all reported receiving credentials. While the eventual pass rate of GED examinees is unknown, these studies suggest that it is higher than the rates reflected in the annual statistics.
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As a rule, the tests present written passages and multiple choice questions (five choices per question). Sometimes they also provide additional information needed to answer the questions, such as mathematical formulas. The writing skills test focuses on such things as the mechanics of writing (grammar, punctuation, spelling), sentence structure, and logic of presentation. Since 1988, the test has also required examinees to write a short essay.[9] The social studies, science, and literature exams emphasize ability to read and understand materials in these fields, including text, tables, and graphics. The math test originally focused on arithmetic, but by 1988, its composition was 50 percent arithmetic, 30 percent algebra, and 20 percent geometry (GED Testing Service 1993a). Currently, a new battery of tests, called GED 2000, is being developed by the GED Testing Service.
In general, the tests emphasize the ability to read, write, think, and do math, though some subject matter knowledge is needed. For example, the 1993 practice test on social studies required basic knowledge of the functions of the federal legislative, executive, and judicial branches to answer some questions. In the science test, correctly answering one question required knowing that cold temperature precipitates water from moist air. In the math test, examinees had to know how to use the formulas that were provided.
Above the minimums, states have been free to set their own conditions for passing the GED and awarding credentials (GED Testing Service 1993a, Patience and Whitney 1982). Table 2 shows the numbers of states with different minimum score requirements in 1995 and the proportion of graduating high school seniors who met a given standard in a 1987 administration of the tests.
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The current minimum of 40 on each test and an average of 45 on all five, established in January 1997, is more selective than the previous 40 or 45. Some 75 percent of the 1987 seniors met the previous standard, but only 66 percent scored 40 and 45.
There has long been debate over the appropriate level at which to set standards for passing the test. Some educators and researchers believe that the cut scores are too low and that the credential does not reflect the level of skills needed for postsecondary education and the workplace (see Quinn 1997a). Others favor the current standards or less rigorous ones, regarding more difficult standards as barriers that block opportunity and discourage an already discouraged population of high school dropouts. Some of the issues in this debate parallel those in the debate over standards in the broader education community.
The GED tests have become harder to pass over the years. It is noteworthy that by 1995, 46 states had adopted standards that were more selective than the minimum of 40 or 45 required at the time. This represented a major, long-term change in the cut scores set by states. As of 1949, only 22 of the then 48 states had adopted scores above the ACE minimums of 35 or 45 (Dressl and Schmid 1951). Thus, over time, ACE raised the required minimum scores, and the states increasingly adopted passing scores above the ACE minimums. Whether this pattern will be repeated with the 1997 GED minimums has yet to be seen. Currently only two states have passing standards higher than the new minimum.
One measure of the ease or difficulty of passing a multiple choice test is the number of correct answers above chance guessing that is needed to meet the minimum passing requirement. Table 3 presents this information for 1995 and for 1944, one of the first years of the GED.[11] The first column shows the number of questions on a given test; the second shows the number that would be correctly answered by chance (usually one out of five choices); the third shows the minimum number of correct answers required to pass the test; and the fourth shows the difference between the number of correct answers expected by chance and the number required to pass.
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In 1944, the required passing score on each test was just slightly above chance, except in writing. In 1995, the required passing score was about twice the number expected by chance. By this measure, as well as others, the GED has become harder to pass over time.[12]
In the norming process, national samples of seniors are administered one or more of the five GED tests. Statistics such as the mean, standard deviation, and range are computed from the raw scores (e.g., number of correct items) for a given test. These statistics are then used to develop standard scores for the test. The standard scores of seniors are scaled to have a mean of 50, a standard deviation of 10, and a range from 20 to 80 on each test.
To understand the scoring of the GED, it is useful to examine the distribution of scores from one of the tests in the 1987 norming. Table 4 shows how a sample of high school seniors performed on the GED Science Test. (Four other samples of seniors performed similarly on the four other tests.)
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There were 60 items on the test; the "Raw Score" column shows the number correct out of 60. About half of the sample (48-51 percent) answered 40 or 41 questions correctly. The corresponding mean standard score is 50. From one standard deviation below the mean (40) to one standard deviation above (60) encompasses a little more than two thirds of the cases. The remaining cases are in the tails of the distribution--the 14 percent with standardized scores below 40 and the 16 percent with scores above 60.
The seniors did not have trouble answering many of the questions in 1987, but scaling compensates for the apparent ease of the test. A GED examinee would have to answer two-thirds of the questions correctly to get a standard score of 50, equal to the mean for high school seniors. By answering 58 of the 60, he or she would score 73 and outperform all but one percent of the seniors.
At the lower end of the distribution, a GED examinee scoring 40, the passing minimum since 1982, would outperform only 14 percent of the seniors who took the test. Of course, it is more difficult to get the minimum score on all five tests than on just one. The probabilities cannot be estimated from the scores on each test. However, a sample of seniors took all five tests in 1987, and that part of the norming process is discussed below.
The GED tests are designed to give examinees "the opportunity to demonstrate achievement comparable to that of high school graduates" (GED Testing Service 1993a). On average, GED recipients do perform as well as graduating high school seniors on each test. For example, Enger and Howerton (1988) found that 1985-86 GED recipients who had been administered tryout forms for the 1987 norming (in addition to the regular GED test battery) answered approximately the same number and percent of questions correctly on each of the five tests as did the 1987 samples of seniors.[14] (The authors also reported that the samples of seniors were fairly representative, though private school students were over-represented.) Similarly, ACE found that 1989 GED recipients had approximately, but not exactly, the same mean scores and the same percent correct on each test as did the 1987 seniors (GED Testing Service 1993a; Baldwin 1992). GED recipients did slightly better than high school seniors on the tests that emphasize reading--social studies, science, and literature--and not quite as well on the math and writing skills tests.[15]
While the performance of GED recipients on each test is comparable to that of high school seniors, interpreting their performance on the full five-test battery is more complicated. The performance of GED examinees is referenced to that of a sample of high school seniors who took all five tests in 1987. Based on observations in Wisconsin, Quinn believes that the sample of seniors who took the seven and one-half hour test battery tended to lack motivation to do well on it (Quinn 1997a, 1997b). Low rates of participation in taking the battery also suggested to her that the national sample of senior test takers may not have been representative (see appendix A).
In general, one can have reasonable confidence in the 1987 senior score distributions on the individual tests. However, statistics from the administration of the five-test battery bear closer examination.
Beginning in the 1980s, new challenges to the GED arose in several areas. First, a series of studies by the U.S. military services showed that attrition rates of enlistees with GED certificates were similar to those of high school dropouts and about twice those of high school graduates. Consequently, the military stopped regarding GED certification as equivalent to a high school diploma for purposes of selection among applicants.
Second, starting in 1984, the Department of Public Instruction in Wisconsin conducted a thorough study of GED programs in the state. It found that GED recipients who enrolled in Wisconsin colleges and universities were much more likely than high school graduates to leave them, and that their grades and other measures of performance were lower than those of high school graduates. As a result of this research, the state raised its minimum standard for passing to 40 and 50, raised the minimum age for taking the tests to 18 1/2, and required coursework (in addition to passing the tests) for a GED diploma, as distinct from a GED certificate. The minimum scores for passing the tests were subsequently lowered after a 1993 statewide norming study found that half the state's high school seniors could not pass the tests. Wisconsin's new standard is still the highest in the nation: its 40 and 46 requirement (see table 2) is one point higher than the new minimum set by ACE.
Third, a study of GED labor market outcomes by economists Stephen Cameron and James Heckman (1993) concluded that GED certificate holders are less likely to be employed, earn less, and experience more job turnover than high school graduates. The authors argued that GED graduates more closely resemble high school dropouts than high school graduates by these measures.
These research efforts have stimulated new debate over the value of the GED as a means of promoting opportunity for non-high school graduates in postsecondary education, the civilian labor market, and the military. We will examine the performance of GED recipients in these arenas, but before doing so, we must understand how the GED process works in a social context. The GED is said to perform a number of important functions. The next section describes these functions and assesses the evidence on the extent to which the process actually performs them.
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[Functions of the GED]