What Does GED Stand For?

GED technically has a few different meanings depending on who you talk to.  Two of the most common definitions are General Educational Development and Graduate Equivalency Degree.

What is a GED and How Do I Get One?

The GED is technically a test (more specifically a series of tests) designed to show that a person has high-school level academic skills.  By passing the GED Test, a person is awarded with a Certificate of High School Equivalency.  Many people simply refer to this certificate as a GED.

This is not actually a high school diploma but carries about the same authority as one.

The GED is a series of five tests, each one representing a different school subject.

The tests are:

• Reasoning: Includes Reading and Writing
• Social Studies
• Science
• Mathematics

The point is to show that you know all of the information a high school graduate is expected to know.  The tests are standardized.

Each test is graded on a scale to  200.  Typically, a person must get at least 145 to pass an individual test. If a person fails one of the tests but passes the others, they only need to retake the parts they failed.