How To Improve Community College Developmental Education: Part 2
Guest blogger, Nancy Shulock, California State University-Sacramento
California and the nation are facing the challenge of increasing college attainment levels while serving the growing population of under-prepared students in its colleges. We can learn from what leading-edge states are doing to increase the success of under-prepared students for whom traditional remedial sequences have not proven effective. A review of developmental education policy reforms reveals the following trends[i]:
- Minimizing the time students spend in remedial coursework by replacing long sequences of semester-long courses with options that include:
- modular courses with open entry/open exit as students’ competencies dictate
- contextualized remedial courses whereby students learn basic skills in the context of substantive content, sometimes in paired courses
- supplemental remedial instruction where students with limited deficiencies enroll in college-level courses and receive targeted assistance with needed basic skills
- Achieving a balance between permissiveness and restrictiveness with respect to access to college-level courses by under-prepared students by:
- allowing students into college-level courses concurrent with their remedial enrollments as long as the course does not require skills related to those that need remediation (the key being reading – states generally do not allow students who are not proficient in reading to take college-level courses)
- requiring students to begin and complete remediation early by setting limits, for example, on the number of credits students may earn before completing remediation
- Using content review to support the overall reform goal of ensuring that students spend only the minimal time needed in remedial education by:
- examining and aligning the content of college-level and remedial courses
- using that content review as the basis for placing or directing students into appropriate courses
[i] Education Commission of the States, Getting Past Go: Rebuilding the Remedial Education Bridge to College Success, May, 2010, as supplemented by personal communication with lead author Bruce Vandal, July 2, 2010.
