So wait, let’s get this straight: we’re not talking about leaving college early, but about leaving high school early!?
“You’re crazy!”
That’s right. But, maybe not as crazy as you think.
Dropping out of high school for the right reasons is not only possible, but in some cases, the right choice.
It’s a more common path among school dropouts than most would think. Among those “high school dropouts” include myself, two other friends, and XXX, one of the founders of Stripe (the $1B+ unicorn).
We won’t cover the good (and bad) reasons to drop out here. You can find those discussed in my previous article The dropout checklist.
Here we’ll assume you’ve decided on leaving high school, and are ready to make the leap. Life can change quickly, so it’s important to have a backup plan in place if you decide to go back to school (which usually means going to college). Most colleges require at least a high school diploma to enroll, so what can we do?
“Easy, just get a GED – right?”
Maybe it’s that easy. But probably not.
Don’t you just need a GED?
A GED (General Education Diploma) is the legal substitute for a high school diploma in the United States. Each state administers their own GED exam, but the gist is the same – pass the test, and you get a free-and-clear high school diploma.
The problem is the GED is designed for students to catch up with their peers, not get ahead of them. In most all circumstances, you’re only allowed to take the GED after your expected high school graduation date (i.e. past your 18th birthday). You can read more about this here
A GED is targeted at people who left school early due to illness, incarceration, or other bad turns of events. It is possible to wait until your 18th birthday and then take the GED, but there’s a much better (and much less well-known) option: The CHSPE.
What the hell is a CHSPE?
CHSPE stands for the California High School Proficiency Exam, which is a test that can be taken by any US student to get a California High School Equivalency Certificate. Unlike the GED where you must wait until after your expected graduation date, the CHSPE program allows students as young as 15 years old to leave school with a diploma in hand.
Notice, an Equivalency Certificate is not the same thing as a bona-fide “high school diploma” you’re more formally acquainted with. That said, in nearly all circumstances they’re functionally equivalent.
The CHSPE certificate is only required to be equivalent with a HS diploma inside the State of California, but it turns out most other places (including the US Federal Government) also accept the CHSPE certificate as a bona-fide High School Diploma.
During my research process in 2015, I reached out to the admissions offices of a handful of colleges including ivy-leagues like Stanford and MIT to ask their stance the CHSPE certificate. Stanford Admissions told me they accept CHSPE certificates like any regular high school diploma (as they legally must, being in California), and MIT told me you don’t need a high school diploma to apply at all!.
Of course, there’s many shades of grey here. Do your own research for schools you would be interested in, but generally a CHSPE certificate will check the boxes for any US-based university.
What’s the CHSPE test like?
If you’ve gotten to this point, you’ll soon find out the test itself is one of the easiest parts of the process. The test covers a variety of material in high school level math, reading, and writing. They have some sample tests posted here you can take a look at.
If you’ve taken an end-of-year state exam in high school (like most students do every year), you’ll find the CHSPE exam to be very similar.
As any example, this was the hardest question on my CHSPE test in 2015:
Cardinal directions like “North”, “West”, and “Northwest” are capitalized in English.
Should the word “Northwestern” also be capitalized?
Answer: Proper nouns are capitalized (“North”), but adjectives (like “northern”) are not!
Frankly, the exam itself is very easy and you should have no issues passing with flying colors if you aren’t failing out of high school. You can review the prior test materials if you want to prepare, but it’s not even close to the difficulty of the SAT or ACT.
How can I sign up for the CHSPE exam?
The process is pretty simple. The site to sign up is located here (CHSPE Website), which will ask for some basic information and the $xxx fee. You can choose a testing date, which vary depending on the time of the year, and you’re good to go!
Being a California test, all of the testing locations are located in various major cities in California (namely San Francisco and Los Angeles). You’ll need to arrange a flight or other way of getting there and back if you’re not local.
I flew in from Dallas, Texas the day before the test and flew out the day after on Spirit for a little over $100 round-trip, for a combined total of around $350.
It’s not a cheap diploma to get, but the reality is that if you can’t comfortably afford a $350 expense you need to seriously reconsider dropping out of high school – things do not get cheaper or easier from here.
Why wouldn’t I take the CHSPE?
There are a few reasons you might not want to take the CHSPE, and take the GED or look into alternative options instead.
1. You’re at or over the age of 18, when you would have already graduated high school.
You can take your state’s GED instead of taking the CHSPE, which will come with fewer strings and travel costs attached. The GED already has a long history of acceptance, and is legally the same as your state’s high school diploma. The exam may or may not be harder than the CHSPE, but it’s still not likely to be all-that difficult.
2. You expect to do large amounts of international long-term travel, study, or work
This one is tricky, because if you’re underage (that is, under 18) you don’t have many other options available to you, given that you won’t be eligible to take the GED. That said, attending schools internationally can get tricky with a CHSPE diploma because it’s quite rare and again, not quite the same thing as a real high school diploma.
I’ve traveled and studied in China where I had no issues using my CHSPE certificate as proof of a high school diploma, but your luck may vary if you travel to schools in countries like Germany where the standards for certification and authentication are much higher.
This is truly uncharted territory, so if you plan on studying abroad keep this in mind – you may have to return to take your state GED at some point.
3. You’re still not sure if you want to leave school
It is true, you can take (and pass) the CHSPE exam and still graduate from your regular high school. The certificate itself has no bearing on your local education history or credentials, and passing the CHSPE does not force you to leave school immediately afterwards. You can throw your shiny certificate in the trash and forget it ever happened (minus the few hundred dollars you spent to get it).
That said, dropping out of high school is very serious. This is not something you should do because the homework is too hard, the teachers too boring, or because your you don’t like your friends.
You need to have real, solid plans of making enough money to support yourself, and a clear reason why you’d be better off leaving school than staying.
I cover this more in depth in the The Dropout Checklist, but it’s worth repeating here. There are lifelong repercussions for going down this path, so you need to be sure this is a route you want to go down.
Key Takeaways:
- The CHSPE is an exam available to students age 15 or older, who wish to leave high school early, but want the option to return to college at some later point.
- If you’re considering leaving high school early, the CHSPE exam is an easy way to hedge your bets while letting you choose your own path forward.