TRENTON, N.J. – A bill to eliminate New Jersey’s high school graduation proficiency exam advanced in the Assembly Education Committee, igniting a debate over standards, equity, and workforce readiness.
Assemblywoman Michele Matsikoudis’ measure would remove the New Jersey Graduation Proficiency Assessment as a graduation requirement while leaving other state testing and local assessments in place.
Assemblywoman Dawn Fantasia opposed the move, warning that dropping the test without a replacement lowers expectations and risks wider gaps in preparedness.
Matsikoudis (R-Union) argued the exit test “interrupts eight to 12 hours of valuable instruction time,” is “costly to administer,” and is just one of several exams students already take, saying, “Removing it as a graduation requirement does not eliminate the ability of teachers and staff to assess student performance.”
What the bill does and why it moved now
The bill (A4121) bars the State Board of Education from including a statewide graduation proficiency test in its standards for high school graduation or requiring it to receive a state-endorsed diploma.
Supporters note only a handful of states still require a graduation test and say years of coursework, grades, and existing assessments provide adequate evidence of readiness.
They also point to recent history: graduation testing was waived for the classes of 2020 and 2021 during pandemic closures, and the class of 2023 took the test for data collection only, not as a graduation gate.
Matsikoudis added, “Graduation exit tests are a snapshot in time and do not accurately reflect mastery of a subject or a student’s skills,” arguing a student’s portfolio over years is “sufficient to determine college readiness.”
The statewide test is typically administered in 11th grade in English and mathematics, primarily via computer with paper options as an accommodation.
Critics warn of lowered standards and uneven signals to employers
Fantasia, citing her experience “as a district Test Coordinator,” said “Eliminating a standard I don’t feel is reform. I think it’s retreat,” and pushed back on “factually shaky justification for removing the test entirely with no adequate or legitimate replacement.”
She said employers do not ask about the graduation test “because historically, the diploma is the credential that indicates that they pass the test,” adding, “Employers may not ask for test scores, but they do notice the decline in readiness,” and referenced NJBIA testimony on preparedness.
Fantasia pointed to college remediation, saying, “50% of New Jersey high school graduates, as they enter college, are forced to take remedial classes in English and math,” and argued, “Real life does not pause for our feelings,” comparing the exit exam to professional and trade licensing tests.
Addressing equity, she warned that eliminating the test would let “600 plus school districts” set their own metrics for graduation, creating “600 different reasons,” and that “A diploma from Chatham is going to mean something very different than a diploma from one of the 31 former Abbott or SDA schools.”
She cited the “64th floor” policy once used in Asbury Park as a cautionary tale, saying, “We saw graduation rates jump… They made it so no student could fail… You don’t replace academic achievement with community service,” and urged, “fix the exam, improve remediation, support multilingual learners, expand tutoring, strengthen early literacy and numeracy, and modernize this assessment.”
The bill previously passed the Assembly in 2023 but was not considered in the Senate.
If enacted, New Jersey would join most states that do not require a statewide exit exam for graduation.
Committee action Thursday sends the bill to the full Assembly for further consideration.
Fantasia summarized her stance: “When adults lower expectations, students follow… Do not hand out a diploma disconnected from proficiency.”
Assemblywoman Fantasia’s Entire Speech
I spoke to the bill’s sponsors, both of them on this, and I truly believe both of them have the best intentions for our students. What I’m pushing back on and firmly is the factually shaky justification for removing the test entirely with no adequate or legitimate replacement for this exam. Eliminating a standard I don’t feel is reform.I think it’s retreat. In committee, I heard statements that just don’t hold up under scrutiny. For example, someone had said employers aren’t asking whether students passed the graduation test.
Of course they aren’t, because historically, the diploma is the credential that indicates that they pass the test. For instance, you don’t ask a nurse if they pass their board exams because their certification is the obvious evidence of them passing the test. Employers may not ask for test scores, but they do notice the decline in readiness. As a matter of fact, NJBIA testified at our committee to say that they have noticed a decline in readiness of employees entering the field. Meanwhile, 50% of New Jersey high school graduates, as they enter college, are forced to take remedial classes in English and math, classes that are repeats of what they would have taken in high school, relearning high school material that they were already credited for.
Then we heard, what if a girl breaks up with her boyfriend the day of the test and fails? At what point did accountability leave the building?Real life does not pause for our feelings. Doctors sit for board exams, welders take certification, lawyers sit for the bar exam, electricians take licensing exams. Point as the world demands performance under pressure. These are young adults, teenagers 17, 18 that are about to enter the workforce in college.
Removing our expectations does not fix that. We all want schools to have autonomy. As someone who works in New Jersey education, actually as a district Test Coordinator for all of those tests that are frequently demonized, I understand that sometimes it feels like overkill. However, the solution is not removing this requirement.
Shielding students now is going to hand recap them later. We see what happens when we reduce graduation expectations and requirements, because another one of the arguments was that they already have to meet credit hours, they already have to pass certain classes, they already have to meet attendance. We’re all very familiar of the last time we tried this experiment, and it failed miserably. That was called the 64th floor in Asbury Park.
They were a wonder of success on paper. We saw graduation rates jump from 48% to 82% graduation. It was a miracle of miracles. We asked, What did they do? They made it so no student could fail. The lowest grade you could score was a 64, not a zero.Also, we gave you credit for algebra. If you perform community service. If you volunteered your time, if you worked in a park, you got credit for graduation. Now, no one says that community service isn’t a great quality for our students, but the two can coexist. You don’t replace academic achievement with community service. The two can go hand in hand. When we stop prioritizing reading, writing, and math literacy, the students won’t magically gain those skills.
They have to find them somewhere. If anything, we’re going to widen the gap between the diploma we hand them and their actual preparedness. But here is one thing that I look at a totally different way than some of the other speakers did. That was when we talk about equity, equity for graduation and the diploma. We are now allowing 600 plus school districts to come up with their own metric as to what graduation ready is when they graduate high school.
600 different reasons. Employers and colleges will now look at schools who lower the bar so low. In our more affluent areas, they may keep the bar very high because those students are capable, in everybody’s mind, of achieving.It’s wrong what we doing to our impoverished communities, our schools, and lower socioeconomic classes. What we are actually telling them is, You can’t do it. Our solution is removing the requirement and lowering the bar, not lifting you up. We’ll just make it easier for you. Employers and colleges are going to look at that.
A diploma from Chatham is going to mean something very different than a diploma from one of the 31 former Abbott or SDA schools. When adults lower expectations, students follow. When adults raise expectations, students meet them. Equity isn’t achieved by lowering the bar. I think we need to fix the exam, improve remediation, support multilingual learners, expand tutoring, strengthen early literacy and numeracy, and modernize this assessment, because the assessment isn’t great. I’m not going to sing a song like it’s fantastic. It’s not. But do not hand out a diploma disconnected from proficiency. I think it’s a huge error. Students in New Jersey can do it.
Our policy cannot reflect that they can’t. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.