Nevada Approves ETS's HiSET ® Program for High School Equivalency

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Oct 28, 2013, 01:41 ET

Joins growing number of states offering the affordable, accessible replacement to the GED® test

PRINCETON, N.J., Oct. 28, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Nevada State Board of Education has approved new high school equivalency assessments — including Educational Testing Service's HiSET® program — that will be used throughout Nevada starting January 1, 2014.

Nevada is the eighth state that will begin using the HiSET program — which offers paper-based testing in addition to computer-based testing.

The announcement follows Montana's, New Hampshire's, Tennessee's, Missouri's, Iowa's, Louisiana's and Maine's adoption of the HiSET test during the last several months. The number of states, educators, policymakers and employers looking for a high school proficiency exam replacement that includes elements that are critical to providing out-of-school youth and adults with proof of their readiness for higher education or the workplace is expected to grow.

"The state of Nevada is pleased to be at the forefront of providing options for students for high school equivalency in the United States," said Brad Deeds, State HSE Administrator.

State-approved test centers and their local governing authorities will choose which test or tests to offer starting in January; however, in order to ensure accessibility and affordability for all Nevada students, test centers must offer both a paper- and a computer-based high school equivalency assessment. Therefore, test centers must also offer other high school equivalency exams, including the HiSET test to ensure student access to a paper-based testing option.

Developed by nonprofit Educational Testing Service (ETS) and the University of Iowa's Iowa Testing Program (ITP), the HiSET exam covers the same content areas as the current GED® test, and will be accepted by institutions in the same way; however, the HiSET program's advantages include:

Affordable test fee to keep this valuable credential accessible for candidates, states and educational programs
Up to two retests within 12 months at no additional cost
Flexibility with the use of existing test centers, test prep and curricula
English and Spanish versions of the test
Computer-based and paper-based testing options
Test design and validation by experts in assessment development for fair and reliable results

"ETS and ITP welcome the opportunity to work with educators in Nevada to provide learners in their state with an affordable, accessible high school equivalency exam," says John Oswald, Vice President and General Manager, K–12 Student Assessment Programs, ETS.

"The Phase 1 HiSET test, which will launch in January will be compatible with current instructional materials used for high school equivalency assessment," added Oswald. "It will measure the more rigorous college- and career-readiness standards that most states will use beginning in 2014–2015, such as the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in reading, writing and mathematics as well as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS)."

Phase 2 HiSET test will align even more fully with the CCSS and NGSS once instructional programs for those standards are developed and instructional providers learn how to teach to the new standards. ETS and ITP will work with the states in designing the Phase 2 assessments.

For more information about the ETS HiSET program, please visit http://hiset.ets.org/.

About ETS
At ETS, we advance quality and equity in education for people worldwide by creating assessments based on rigorous research. ETS serves individuals, educational institutions and government agencies by providing customized solutions for teacher certification, English language learning, and elementary, secondary and post-secondary education, as well as conducting education research, analysis and policy studies. Founded as a nonprofit in 1947, ETS develops, administers and scores more than 50 million tests annually — including the TOEFL® and TOEIC ® tests, the GRE® tests and The Praxis Series™ assessments — in more than 180 countries, at over 9,000 locations worldwide. www.ets.org

*GED is a registered trademark of the American Council on Education.

SOURCE ETS