Ohio high schoolers may face ‘double testing’

7/24/2013

COLUMBUS — Ohio’s long-anticipated plan to dump the high-school graduation test and replace it with a tougher college and career-readiness exam and a series of end-of-course tests appears to be in limbo.

State lawmakers and education officials have reopened debate over the graduation requirements.

Without a resolution, sophomores in the 2014-15 school year would be required to take both the current graduation test and the new ones.

Ohio education officials say “double testing” would go on for three years and the state would spend up to $75 million to continue administering the Ohio Graduation Test.

The Ohio Graduation Test was intended to be scrapped after the coming school year.

“The stumbling block comes down to testing,” said House Education Chairman Gerald Stebelton (R., Lancaster).

The new requirements coincide with more-rigorous Common Core curriculum standards, which many schools already use and all must have in place this fall.