Northern Virginia Community College (NOVA), like other community colleges, does not require Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) scores or similar entrance examinations for admission. However, new college applicants must demonstrate their levels of reading, writing, and mathematics skills to determine whether they need developmental courses to prepare…

With the recent implementation of Assembly Bill (AB) 705, assessment and placement practices for math and English have taken center stage in many California Community Colleges. However, it is just as important to develop an understanding of how best to assess and place English language learner (ELL) students as well. In February 2019, the Research…

This short exchange paper reports on the major findings of a forthcoming research monograph, which is going to be published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing, entitled "Theorizing ESL community college students' perception of written feedback." This research project, which was conducted in an international community college in Hong Kong,…

With support from the California Community College Chancellor's Office, the MMAP Research Team, a team of The Research and Planning Group for California Community Colleges (RP Group) conducted a literature review on various assessment measures used for English as a Second Language (ESL) programs to explore effective assessment methods including…

For the forty-fourth time, the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) is sponsoring the publication of these Proceedings. Papers published in this volume were presented online and onsite during the annual AECT Convention. Volume 1 contains papers dealing primarily with research and development topics. Papers dealing with…

This study aimed at describing how the implementation of Task-Based Learning (TBL) would shape or change students' use of oral communication strategies. Students' problems and strategies to solve the problems during the implementation of TBL were also explored. The study was a mixed method, employing both quantitative and qualitative analysis…

The purpose of this article is to describe a procedure that has been used successfully to evaluate the critical thinking (CT) abilities of a population of undergraduates having limited proficiency in the English language. The results of this study demonstrate that it is possible to obtain reliable evaluations of CT skills in undergraduates who…

Increased demands for colleges and universities to engage in outcomes assessment for accountability purposes have accelerated the need to bridge the gap between higher education practice and the fields of measurement, assessment, and evaluation. The "Handbook on Measurement, Assessment, and Evaluation in Higher Education" provides higher…

The difficulty of determining if a student's learning difficulties are the results of learning disabilities or issues related to cultural and linguistic diversity (CLD), often causes problems when individuals are referred for a learning disability assessment. This article discusses the many issues related to assessment of adults in community…

When the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges compiled best practices for serving basic skills students in 2002-2003, assessment practices were notably absent. In this paper, problems with current assessment and placement practices with regards to basic skills are explored. The paper begins with a review of the matriculation process…

English as a second language (ESL) programs in community colleges are as diverse in the models they follow as the students they serve. This volume provides a detailed look at how faculty and administrators are tailoring their ESL programs to best serve the needs of their students and the missions of their institutions. The authors of the thirteen…