High School Exit Examinations and State-Level Completion and GED Rates, 1973-2000* Version: October 2004 John Robert Warren Department of Sociology University of Minnesota Krista N. Jenkins Department of Sociology University of Pennsylvania Rachael B. Kulick Department of Sociology University of Minnesota Working Paper No. 2005-08 https://doi.org/10.18128/MPC2005-08 WORKING DRAFT: PLEASE DO NOT CITE OR QUOTE WITHOUT PERMISSION *Paper prepared for presentation at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America, Boston, April 2004. Support for this project has been provided by the Spencer Foundation’s Major Grants Program and by the University of Minnesota’s Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. We are also very grateful to Christopher Uggen, Dean Lillard, Jennifer C. Lee, Daniel Koretz, Robert Hauser, and several anonymous reviewers for their helpful advice and feedback. However, errors and omissions are the responsibility of the authors. Please direct correspondence to John Robert Warren, Department of Sociology, University of Minnesota, 909 Social Sciences, 267 ~ 19th Ave. South, Minneapolis, MN 55455 or email
[email protected]. High School Exit Examinations and State-Level Completion and GED Rates, 1973-2000 ABSTRACT We investigate the extent to which high school exit examinations are associated with state-level high school completion rates in the United States. To do so, we estimate a series of state and year fixed effects models using a new measure of state-level high school completion rates and archival information about states’ high school exit examinations between 1973 and 2000. We find that high school exit examinations --- particularly more difficult examinations that have recently been implemented in some states --- are associated with lower high school completion rates and higher rates of General Educational Development (GED) test taking.