No GED?

No GED? Or are you concerned of taking long GED classes and passing their test? Have you accepted in a college; however you don’t have proof of graduation from high school? Do you find that all the centers for GED are full and you might miss your session for college? I work for a reputed nationally accredited degree granting college which offer career focused education. When I conduct career assessment I find many individuals without high school diploma. I completely agree that most of the time it’s not students fault not having a diploma. If you are one of them, then don’t think that door to your career is closed. It’s wide open for you. There are many options besides GED that can get you into a career college.
Let me share the story of one of my students named Juan. Juan came to me last fall to start school with us. He had a foreign high school diploma. When I interviewed him he sounded very proficient in English and also academic about his career interest. He passed our acceptance test and he was also eligible for financial aid. The only barrier for him from coming to our college and pursue bachelors’ degree was his documentation for high school diploma. I found it a total misuse of time if I let him go down for one tern to wait for a GED. There were two options open for him. One of them is his foreign high school transcript which can get evaluated by NACES ( http://www.naces.org/members.htm). However, he still needed to produce English language proficiency by sitting for TOEFL or ESL class. If he would follow this option it would take him at least 6 months to join our college. GED would have been another option. However in large cities, to register for GED tests can take months. Juan and I started brainstorming to find out what can we do to get him started as early as possible and to move away from this lengthy process. After days of long research we finally discovered an Online Self Pace High School equivalency program (http://www.continentalacademy.com/home.html) which is accepted by most of the career focused colleges. And guess what he finished his high school equivalency in 4 days. It only cost him couple of hundred dollars. And he started school right on time. And that way he saved long waiting and study for GED or TOEFL or ESL classes.