GED« TESTING FEE SEES MODEST INCREASE
SPRINGFIELD— The cost to take the General Educational Development (GED) Tests in Illinois is going up, but not as high as some had proposed, state officials announced today.
Effective July 1, 2009, the GED Testing fee will increase to $50. Since 2002, the fee has been $35. The Illinois Community College Board (ICCB) approved the fee increase recently.
"The fee increase is a direct result of rising costs in testing materials and the costs to administer the tests," said Guy Alongi, chairman of the ICCB. "There was discussion that the new fee should be as much as $85, but we kept the cost down."
More than 15,700 persons in Illinois received their GED diploma last year. More than 26,000 individuals take the test in Illinois annually.
According to Jennifer Foster, the state director for GED Testing, almost 1.8 million adults in Illinois do not have a high school diploma. Persons passing the GED Tests earn a high school equivalency certificate and an opportunity to seek higher education.
Foster explained that the increase did not come without some tough decisions.
"We have tried several approaches to reduce the deficit in administering the tests, and a fee increase was the last thing we wanted," Foster said. "But after seven years without an increase, increasing the fee was something we had to do. I am happy that we didn\'t have to raise it anymore than we did."
Noting the importance of GED Testing, Foster explained that the number of adults in Illinois with less than a ninth-grade education has increased by seven percent since 2004. The fiscal burden Illinois taxpayers bear for each person with less than a high school diploma currently averages $221,000 over the course of his or her lifetime, according to a recent study.
