Developmental Education

Carnegie’s Pathways instructional model addresses not just the structural and curricular problems of traditional developmental math courses, but also the substantial socio-emotional and psychological hurdles many students face. The courses are designed to challenge certain beliefs that many developmental math students share: that they are not “math people,” that “people like me don’t belong here,” and that the class is really not about or for them.

From Innovation to Transformation tells the short story of how Texas community colleges decided to implement the New Mathways Project in every college in the state. The decision grew out of many years of collaboration among partners, statewide experimentation with developmental education redesign, and a maturation of student success initiatives and demonstration projects designed to help students succeed and advance toward degrees.

Higher education has always been a pathway to opportunity. For generations of Americans of all backgrounds, an education beyond high school has led to upward mobility in our society. This role for higher education is more important today than ever before.

Even as colleges invest tremendously in higher education reform, including improving student success rates, there has been little opportunity to hear from the most directly impacted stakeholder group- the students. This report, based on student focus group data from 161 current and former community college students in four states, presents the viewpoint of students in relation to their education goals and college experience.

Community colleges across the country have created innovative, data-informed programs that are models for educating underprepared students, engaging traditionally underserved students, and helping students from all backgrounds succeed. However, because most of these programs have limited scope, the field now has pockets of success rather than widespread improvement. Turning these many small accomplishments into broad achievement — and improved completion rates — depends on bringing effective programs to scale.

Last August, President Obama challenged the nation and American higher education to produce 8 million more college graduates by 2020, listing this as “the single most important step we can take” to ensure the nation succeeds in the 21st century. For their part, community colleges were asked to increase the number of associate degrees and certificates they award by 5 million, making these institutions responsible for over 60 percent of the graduates needed to reach the goal.

Our nation can only meet its ambitious college completion goals if students who start in developmental education succeed. Virginia—like nearly every state and, indeed, many countries—has therefore turned its attention to helping more students prepare more effectively and efficiently for college-level work.

This study opens with a brief on Florida's developmental education policies, as seen from the perspective of state administrators, college leaders and college staff. The policy brief is supported by case studies on the practices of three community colleges in Florida that were particularly successful in serving students in need of developmental math, compared to other colleges in the state during the years 2002 to 2008. The brief analyzes how those colleges' strategies and practices interact with state policy.

A significant redesign of remedial education—how it is organized, delivered, and taught—is required if the nation’s community colleges are to achieve more than incremental progress in increasing student success. The vast majority of our nation’s community colleges need substantial ongoing supports to do so.

For most entering community college students, an assessment center is one of the first places they will visit on campus to take exams testing their proficiency in math, reading, and sometimes writing. According to advice the College Board provides to such students, “You can not ‘pass’ or ‘fail’ the placement tests, but it is very important that you do your very best on these tests so that you will have an accurate measure of your academic skills.”