Does the Method of Acceleration Matter? Exploring the Likelihood of College Coursetaking Success Across Four Developmental Education Instructional Strategies

2021 ◽  
Vol 123 (9) ◽  
pp. 3-27
Author(s):  
Christine G. Mokher ◽  
Toby J. Park-Gaghan ◽  
Shouping Hu
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
Instructional Strategies ◽  
Research Question ◽  
Underprepared Students ◽  
College Level ◽  
Success Rates ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Inverse Probability Weighted

Background/Context: Accelerated instructional strategies for developmental education have been promoted as a way to help underprepared students to progress more quickly through college-level coursework. Yet, what remains unknown is whether certain accelerated strategies are more effective than others and whether this initial acceleration may lead to longer term success. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study: We examine whether the likelihood of success varies for completion of mathematics and English requirements over 3 years among the Florida students enrolled in courses using one of four developmental instructional strategies: compressed, corequisite, modularized, or contextualized. Population/Participants/Subjects: Our sample includes all first-time-in-college students during the 2015–2016 year who enrolled in all 28 public state colleges and took any developmental education course during the first year. Research Design: We use inverse probability-weighted regression adjustment (IPWRA) to compare success rates in completion of mathematics and English requirements over 3 years for Florida college students in each of these strategies. Findings/Results: Overall, the results demonstrate variation in the likelihood of success for completion of mathematics and English courses over 3 years among students in different developmental instructional strategies, which suggests that the method of acceleration does matter. Corequisite courses tended to lead to greater long-term gains in math and, to an extent, in reading, while contextualized tended to be most effective in writing. Conclusions/Recommendations: Leaders can play an important role in strengthening institutional capacity to effectively implement developmental education reform by developing faculty buy-in, ensuring adequate resources to scale and sustain reform efforts, and using data to inform future decision-making.

Accelerating to Success: The Impact of Florida's Developmental Education Reform on Credit Accumulation

2020 ◽  
Vol 122 (12) ◽  
pp. 1-38
Author(s):  
Christine G. Mokher ◽  
Toby J. Park-Gaghan ◽  
Shouping Hu
Keyword(s):  
Student Success ◽  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
Support Services ◽  
Underprepared Students ◽  
First Year ◽  
College Level ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Education Courses

Background/Context Underprepared students at community colleges are often assigned to a sequence of developmental education courses that can substantially delay, or even halt, their progress to degree completion. In 2014, Florida implemented a comprehensive reform under Senate Bill (SB) 1720 that allowed the majority of incoming students to enroll directly into college-level courses, while remaining developmental education courses were offered in new instructional modalities that were designed to be completed more quickly than traditional semester-long courses. Colleges provided extensive advising and academic support services intended to help students succeed while progressing at a more accelerated pace. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study In this study, we examined the impact of Florida's developmental education reform on early momentum. More specifically, we defined early momentum as student success in early outcomes (such as the number of credits attempted and earned), which may set students on a promising long-term trajectory on subsequent postsecondary outcomes. Population/Participants/Subjects Our sample included all first-time-in-college students enrolled in all 28 public state colleges. We included three cohorts of students before the reform and up to three cohorts of students after the reform. Each cohort consisted of approximately 70,000 students. Research Design We used an interrupted time series design to compare student outcomes three years before the reform with those up to three years after the reform. Our outcome variables, measured one and three years following initial college enrollment, represented continuous indicators for the number of college-level credits attempted and the number of college-level credits earned. We also examined whether the data revealed heterogeneity in the reform's impacts by race/ethnicity, family income status, and level of high school academic preparation. Findings/Results We found small positive effects on all outcomes, indicating that the reform accelerated student success in both the short term and longer term. The impacts of the reform were even greater for Black, Hispanic, Indigenous, low-income, and underprepared students (particularly in the first year), thus reducing existing achievement gaps. Conclusions/Recommendations Florida's SB 1720 consisted of a complementary set of reform efforts that may together have a larger impact than any single component alone. The results suggest that initial momentum gains in the first year may have set some students on a more successful long-term trajectory, particularly those most likely to be assigned to developmental education before the reform. Colleges should continue to provide comprehensive student support services to help students succeed while progressing at a more accelerated pace.

scholarly journals Do Colleges Perform the Same Following Developmental Education Reform? The Case of Florida’s Senate Bill 1720

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinye Hu ◽  
Shouping Hu
Keyword(s):  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
White Students ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Institutional Characteristics ◽  
College Level ◽  
Passing Rates ◽  
College System ◽  
Institutional Differences ◽  
Florida College

AbstractDevelopmental education (DE) reform took place among the 28 Florida College System (FCS) institutions in 2014. In this study, we examine how cohort-based passing rates in college-level English and math courses changed at different colleges for pre- and post-policy period and explore what institutional characteristics were related with various institutional trajectories of cohort-based course passing rates in the post-policy period. Employing longitudinal data analysis, we found that colleges performed similarly regarding cohort-based passing rates in both college-level English and combined math courses before DE reform and had a similar elevation in the cohort-based English course passing rates when DE reform took place in 2014. However, colleges experienced different change patterns in the years following DE reform. Specifically, colleges located in rural areas and with more White students experienced relatively lower college-level English passing rates in the post-policy period than their counterparts. Different colleges had slight differences in the trajectory of college-level math passing rates by cohort after SB 1720 in 2014, but institutional characteristics in this study did not adequately capture inter-institutional differences.

scholarly journals What Happened Following Comprehensive Developmental Education Reform in the Sunshine State? The Impact of Florida’s Developmental Education Reform on Introductory College-Level Course Completion

2020 ◽  
Vol 49 (9) ◽  
pp. 656-666 ◽  
Author(s):  
Toby J. Park-Gaghan ◽  
Christine G. Mokher ◽  
Xinye Hu ◽  
Hayley Spencer ◽  
Shouping Hu
Keyword(s):  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
White Students ◽  
Interrupted Time Series ◽  
Course Completion ◽  
College Level ◽  
Passing Rates ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Racial Ethnic ◽  
Introductory College

Florida’s Senate Bill 1720 allowed many students to bypass developmental education and enroll directly in introductory college-level courses. We use an interrupted time series design to introductory college-level courses enrollment and passing rates in English and math for three cohorts of college students prereform and three cohorts postreform. Based on a cohort-by-cohort comparative analysis, we find that cohorts after the reform are more likely to enroll and pass introductory college-level courses in their 1st year of college, indicating that the reform may help to accelerate student success in college. Further, we find that Black and Hispanic students experience even greater gains in passing rates than White students, effectively narrowing the racial/ethnic achievement gap.

scholarly journals A Pedagogy of Preparation: Helping Underprepared Students Succeed in College-Level Coursework in Community Colleges

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca L. Brower ◽  
Amanda N. Nix ◽  
Hollie Daniels ◽  
Xinye Hu ◽  
Tamara Bertrand Jones ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Developmental Education ◽  
College Readiness ◽  
Educational Philosophy ◽  
State Level ◽  
Academic Preparation ◽  
Underprepared Students ◽  
College Level ◽  
Scaffolded Instruction ◽  
College System ◽  
Florida College

AbstractThis paper presents an overall educational philosophy of working with students underprepared for college-level work, which we term “a pedagogy of preparation.” We consider how instructors scaffolded instruction to foster college readiness in students who were now able to enroll in college-level work regardless of academic preparation after state-level legislation (SB 1720) that dramatically altered the delivery of developmental education in the Florida College System (FCS). We also consider how collaboration increased among campus personnel after the legislation to foster college readiness in students underprepared for college-level work.

Does Developmental Education Reform Help or Hinder the Success of Language Minority Students? An Exploration by Language Minority, ESOL, and Foreign-Born Status

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-57
Author(s):  
Christine G. Mokher ◽  
Toby J. Park-Gaghan ◽  
Shouping Hu
Keyword(s):  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
Interrupted Time Series ◽  
Language Minority ◽  
College Level ◽  
Foreign Born ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Intersecting Identities ◽  
Speakers Of Other Languages ◽  
Additional Support

Abstract Community colleges may face challenges supporting the unique needs of language minority (LM) students whose primary language is not English. Florida provides a unique context for examining whether LM students who are considered underprepared for college-level coursework benefit more from traditional developmental education programs in reading and writing, or reformed programs that allow most students to accelerate or even bypass developmental requirements while providing additional support services. Utilizing statewide data from firsttime-in-college students at all 28 Florida College System institutions, we use an interrupted time series design with an analysis of heterogenous effects to compare first year coursetaking outcomes in English before and after Florida’s developmental education reform for LM versus non-LM students. We also consider the intersecting identities of LM students by further disaggregating results based on whether students took high school courses in English for Speakers of other Languages (ESOL), and for native-born versus foreign-born students. The findings suggest that while the reform’s benefits are similar for LM and non-LM students overall, there are importance differences among LM subgroups which indicate that ESOL and foreign-born students may benefit most.

Assistance or Obstacle? The Impact of Different Levels of English Developmental Education on Underprepared Students in Community Colleges

2016 ◽  
Vol 45 (9) ◽  
pp. 496-507 ◽  
Author(s):  
Di Xu
Keyword(s):  
Community Colleges ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Underprepared Students ◽  
College Level ◽  
Developmental Sequence ◽  
Critical Question ◽  
Course Work ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Different Levels

Developmental education is the most common approach used by community colleges to assist underprepared students for college-level course work. Yet there is limited evidence regarding this strategy on students assigned to the lowest level of the developmental sequence. This paper extends current knowledge on this critical question by examining the impacts of different levels of developmental reading and writing on students’ academic outcomes. The results suggest that the impacts are generally insignificant for students on the margin of needing developmental course work, yet the estimates are negative on students assigned to the lowest level of the developmental sequence. The results therefore support the increasing national push to reform these programs.

scholarly journals The Relationship Between Accelerated Dev-Ed Coursework and Early College Milestones: Examining College Momentum in a Reformed Mathematics Pathway

AERA Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 233285841982943 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Schudde ◽  
Katherine Keisler
Keyword(s):  
Developmental Education ◽  
Course Completion ◽  
Early College ◽  
Developmental Math ◽  
College Level ◽  
Strong Positive Relationship ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Programs Of Study ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

More than half of community college students fail to meet college-readiness standards in math. Developmental education (dev-ed) aims to help students acquire the knowledge and skills to succeed in college-level math but is plagued with low rates of advancement. We examined the impact of a model that accelerates developmental math coursework so that students can complete dev-ed and college math courses in their programs of study within 1 year. Using data from Texas and a propensity score matching approach, we tested the impact of the model on several college milestones. Results suggest that students in the accelerated model were more likely to persist and accumulate college-level credits during the 1st year than those in traditional dev-ed math. After 3 years, there was a strong positive relationship between participation in the accelerated model and important college milestones, like college math course completion and total accumulated college-level credits.

An On-Ramp to Student Success: A Randomized Controlled Trial Evaluation of a Developmental Education Reform at the City University of New York

2021 ◽  
pp. 016237372110089
Author(s):  
Michael J. Weiss ◽  
Susan Scrivener ◽  
Austin Slaughter ◽  
Benjamin Cohen
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Education Reform ◽  
Developmental Education ◽  
College Readiness ◽  
Controlled Trial ◽  
College Level ◽  
Intensive Instruction ◽  
Trained Teachers ◽  
The City ◽  
Education Courses

Most community college students are referred to developmental education courses to build basic skills. These students often struggle in these courses and college more broadly. CUNY Start is a prematriculation program for students assessed as having significant remedial needs. CUNY Start students delay matriculation for one semester and receive time-intensive instruction in math, reading, and writing with a prescribed pedagogy delivered by trained teachers. The program aims to help students complete remediation and prepare for college-level courses. This article describes the results of an experiment at four community colleges (n ~ 3,800). We estimate that over 3 years, including one semester that students spent in the program and two-and-a-half years after the program was complete, CUNY Start substantially increased college readiness, slightly increased credit accumulation, and modestly increased graduation rates (by increasing participation in CUNY’s highly effective Accelerated Study in Associate Programs [ASAP]).

Does Failing a Placement Exam Discourage Underprepared Students from Going to College?

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 46-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paco Martorell ◽  
Isaac McFarlin ◽  
Yu Xue
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Administrative Data ◽  
Regression Discontinuity ◽  
Underprepared Students ◽  
College Level ◽  
Remedial Courses ◽  
New Information ◽  
Exam Scores ◽  
Placement Exam ◽  
Time Required

About one third of college students are required to take remedial courses. Assignment to remediation is generally made on the basis of performance on a placement exam. When students are required to take a placement exam prior to enrolling in college-level courses, assignment to remediation may dissuade students from actually going to college. This is because remediation could increase the time required to complete a degree (because remedial courses do not count toward academic degrees), and also because being identified as needing remediation might have stigma effects or provide students with new information about their unsuitability for college. This paper examines this issue empirically using administrative data from Texas. Using regression discontinuity methods, we find that students whose placement exam scores would require them to be in remediation are no less likely to enroll in college than are students who score just above the remediation placement cutoff.

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