This dissertation examined how adult learners who took developmental mathematics in a community college and passed the courses, viewed their self-efficacy and the roles they felt self-efficacy had on their successful completion of mathematics. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 10 adult learners in two U.S. community colleges.…

Research studies indicated that learning support professionals, which includes postsecondary developmental education professionals, often lacked opportunities for training to engage with the population of students they work with, as well as current instructional practices and/or reforms. While the research is expansive, it has focused on the…

The completion of developmental community college (DCC) courses is a crucial step in community college education to reach the national goal of increasing college success. DCC students are a unique population who require specific strategies such as vocabulary retention (VR) to achieve academic success. Prior research on vocabulary has been limited…

Developmental math courses have long been considered a barrier for students (Benken et al., 2015), especially for minority and low-income students, who are enrolled in developmental courses disproportionately to their peers (Chen, 2016). Research has shown that various redesign efforts (e.g., multiple measures placement, corequisite support,…

For decades, colleges and universities have been grappling with the task of closing the readiness gap for underprepared writers entering the higher education system. Traditional developmental education models are costly and inefficient at best, and detrimental to the matriculation of students at worst. Bridge programs have had moderate success,…

In the United States, students often graduate from high school unprepared to succeed in college. In Alabama, fewer than 25% of high school graduates are college ready. Frequently, unprepared students enroll in community colleges, which are tasked to help them transfer to a four-year institution or to enter the workforce. However, students who need…

The Post-Traditional Remedial Learner in higher education is a student constituency that has historically been "Hidden in Plain Sight" and strikingly absent from substantive discussions that foreground their lived experiences, relevance, and success in post-secondary education. Though physically present on campus and numerically…

Students in developmental math classes have been documented to struggle with arithmetic. This dissertation research was a response to the calls in the literature to qualitatively understand what students are learning in a classroom. Number sequences have been well researched to document the connection of student understanding of math in elementary…

This study was conducted to specifically analyze the experiences of Haitian students during their college developmental education writing classes. The rationale was to fill the gap with scientific knowledge about better ways to help developmental education writing students since there is a need to improve their success rate. The following research…

The purpose of this qualitative comparative case study is to explore the impact of teaching developmental writing through the lens of the ideological model of literacy (Street, 2003) with a new literacies stance (Bailey, 2012). The research compared the engagement levels of students who were given writing instructions through the lens of the…

In higher education, the entry-level, not-for-credit courses in Developmental Education play a pivotal role for incoming degree-seeking students. Focusing specifically on Developmental Writing, at two- and four-year public and private institutions across the country, a common requirement to pass the course is a summative argumentative essay that…

The problem addressed in this study was that many students in DE have a decrease in academic success and, as a result, never make it to college-level courses nor complete a program and earn a degree, leading to a decrease in academic success. The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to provide insight on historically black colleges…

Previous studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of the Repeated Readings intervention at improving reading fluency and reading comprehension. However, research on the effectiveness of fluency interventions focuses on young children, with limited research on the effects on college-age populations. The primary purpose of the current study was…

Developmental English (DE) has been under fire from critics who think it acts as a barrier rather than as a support to the success of students placing into DE. In Texas, such pressures led to a wave of reforms and changes affecting delivery and structure of DE instruction. This dissertation draws on years of internal data at one community college…

Two-year colleges provide access and opportunity for students with various academic backgrounds to pursue a post-secondary education. While two-year colleges take pride in admitting any student with a high school diploma or equivalent, in recent years colleges have been under scrutiny for low completion and graduation rates. Particular attention…