One of the little-known facts in Oregon is that
PSI, the testing provider currently under contract with the state of Oregon, provides the insurance prelicensing education providers with pass/fail rates for their students on a monthly basis. Why aren't you aware of this? Simple... the vast majority of prelicense education companies don't want you to know the results of their testing. Why? Because most providers do not possess a high pass rate.
Before I get into the numbers and data, it's important to understand why a particular provider might have better success in terms of getting their students to pass the test on the first attempt. Keep in mind that every time an insurance prelicense candidate takes the insurance examination, the testing fees must be paid again. We at
ProSchools aren't big fans of testing more than once. We aren't of the mind-set that failed testing attempts are the cure to the state's budget woes (they get a cut of each test fee). We want our students to pass the first time, every time.
Are there pronounced differences in pass rates? Absolutely. Pass rates vary widely among providers, with some prelicense educators possessing a much higher first-time pass rate than others. There are the "cream of the crop" educators, such as
ProSchools, that consistently have the highest pass rates. There are others, unfortunately, who cannot claim such lofty numbers and garner a fairly large percentage of prelicense students simply because they have a lower price for their product. Remember what your momma told you - "You get what you pay for." It's all in the math. A student saves $50 on their prelicense tuition costs, thinking this was a money saver, and then the student takes their examination and fails. Now the testing fees must be paid again. All of a sudden, the student has paid more (due to the testing fees) than he would have had he bought the better education program in the first place. Those of you who know me have heard me say "Our competitors offer a 1984 Chevy, we offer a 2011 Mercedes." Again, you get what you pay for.
Take a look at the pass rates shown below for the most recent (September, 2011) reporting period, which is year-to-date. Notice that I am not naming the competitors... they know who they are. I think that denigrating your competition in a public forum is unprofessional and speaks volumes of the writer. So, we'll simply label our competitors by the number. The numbers speak for themselves...
First-Time Insurance Testing: Pass/Fail Results
Vendor
|
Life and Health Candidates |
Property and Casualty Candidates |
| ProSchools |
93.75% |
75.86% |
| Comp. #1 |
80.77% |
75.00% (4 candidates) |
| Comp. #2 |
80.00% |
66.67% |
| Comp. #3 |
71.43% |
50.00% (2 candidates) |
| Comp. #4 |
66.67% |
44.44% |
- A couple of things to notice regarding these numbers:
- While higher pass percentages generally indicate a more successful program, this statistic must be tempered by considering the actual number of testing candidates using a particular provider. Any provider can boast a pass rate of 100% if they only have two candidates testing and both students pass their exam- the proof is in the numbers overall. If an educational provider puts 30-50 students through the system in a month and can boast a 90+% pass rate, now that's something to talk about.
- ProSchools and one other provider are the 1-2 punch in Oregon in terms of actual numbers of enrolled students and claim more than 75% of all testing candidates. The other providers, while active and viable in the state, cannot claim those types of numbers. There are roughly 10 prelicense educators in Oregon, which means that eight of the ten can claim less than 25% of the students attending their schools.
The Law of Large Numbers is absolute!