Military no longer paying for college aptitude test retakes
The military will no longer pay for service members who failed a Defense Activity for Non-Traditional Education Support (DANTES)-funded test beginning in 2011.
According to a Navy administrative message July 3, service members must pay out-of-pocket to retake College Level Examination Program (CLEP) exams, DANTES Subject Standardization Tests (DSST) and Excelsior College Examinations (ECE) as of May 20. Retest funding will continue for those who tested before May 2010 and retest before December 2010.
DANTES, which falls under the Department of the Navy and provides test funding for service members everywhere, hopes the change will provide an incentive for studying as well as saving money.
Eight thousand service members took funded retests in fiscal year 2009, costing DANTES approximately $1 million, said Ann Hunter, Navy Voluntary Education Service chief.
“We want service members to study,” added Hunter. “You wouldn't go into a final exam and just gunjack it, would you?”
Service members who do not receive a passing score on a CLEP test, DSST or ECE must wait 180 days between test dates and must personally fund the retest. Costs for the tests, averaging $70 per exam, have not changed, but funding a retest varies depending on the test site.
“What they're doing is they're not opening the door for you to take the test over and over again,” said Kimberly Baars, station education services officer. “They're trying to put the gravity of taking the test on the service member.”
As well, retests are no longer automatically transmitted from the testing contractor to the service member's registry transcripts. Students must contact the individual testing agencies to order a transcript or, if testing for a degree, designate an institution code.
At Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, 43 service members took a DANTES-funded test in 2009. This year, 23 have taken the exam so far.
Lance Cpl. Sean Dennison writes for Desert Warrior, the newspaper at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma.
