Effectiveness of Recruits Assigned to Academic Remedial Training

From April, 1967 until September, 1972, 1517 naval recruits at San Diego were assigned to the Academic Remedial Training Division after having failed to pass the initial academic test because of a reading disability. The rate of effectiveness (being on active duty or successfully completing an enlistment) for those men assigned to remedial reading and for a control sample of recruits not assigned to such training as well as to evaluate the predictive validity of variables related to effectiveness for men assigned to the remedial program was studied. Results indicated that 53.5% of the remedial readers and 62.3% of the controls were effective; higher values of final reading level, the Armed Forces Qualification Test, and educational attainment were predictive of military effectiveness. In addition to helping remedial readers remain on active duty, the academic remedial training program may have helped more than half of all men assigned to the school to perform effectively in the Navy.