GED Testing Service offered a number of professional development and information sessions during the 2020 COABE Virtual Conference.

During this year’s virtual event, held June 29-30, July 1-2 and July 6-9, we also sponsored an exhibit booth to ‘meet and greet’ with conference participants and answer questions related to the GED test program and related resources.

Our conference session highlights are listed below:

• Best Practices for GED Corrections Test Administrators
• Accommodations Update
• Writing Effective Extended Responses on the GED® RLA Test – It’s All About the Claim!
• Marketing, PR and Outreach for Adult Ed Programs
• Helping Students Transition from ABE to GED Instruction – Starting Where Students are and Moving Them Forward
• GED Tools and Essentials for New Educators, Program Directors and Test Proctors
• Using Algebra Tiles in the ABE and GED Classrooms
• Yes, There are Spanish Resources for the GED Classroom
• Protecting Your Program and Students; Understanding How to Influence and Educate State Legislators and Policymakers
• All About the Online Proctored GED Test
• Pick Up that Smart Phone and Learn!
• Improving GED Pass Rates; New Products, Tools and Resources to Help Students Succeed

Thank you to all conference participants who attended our virtual sessions and visited our booth. We look forward to see you all online and in-person soon!

Since the launch of the Online Proctored (O.P.) GED test pilot in late May more than 1,700 GED tests have been taken remotely.

Over the course of the pilot we have received feedback from test takers that has provided insight on how to improve the testing experience. Below we’ve outlined one of the updates coming to the O.P. testing experience.

Whiteboard and Scratch Pad Tools

Beginning in late July, an onscreen whiteboard option will be available to test takers in addition to the scratch pad tool. Due to test security reasons, students cannot use physical scratch paper or dry erase boards during test sessions and instead must use these tools for notetaking and math work. With the whiteboard students can:

• Copy/paste exam questions into the whiteboard text box so they can see them while they work
• Draw different shapes and lines as needed
• Pan across the whiteboard, zooming in and out to use different areas to do the work on the same whiteboard screen
• Erase or clear to start something new: the work will be accessible in every section during the entire exam
• Resize or move the whiteboard around the screen

GED State Relationship Manager Jonna McDonough Forsyth shares details about her work with the GED test program.

Hours tracked in the FastForward program can be used for “contact hours” per the latest OCTAE guidance.

When students are logged in their account they can go into their “gradebook”. From there they will see “All Courses Cumulative Time on Task: xxxxx” or they can filter by subject to see how much time they spent on each subject.