A significant challenge in higher education is to narrow the educational attainment gap between academically prepared and unprepared students. To this end, developmental or remedial education is intended to improve the academic skills and knowledge of students who are unprepared for undergraduate coursework, particularly in the areas of…

Community college stakeholders are searching with increasing urgency for approaches with the potential to improve the success rates for community college students, particularly those in need of developmental education. "Learning communities," which place cohorts of students together in two or more courses for one semester, are a popular…

In this study the author examines the cultural dimension of communalism, one of the nine dimensions of Afrocultural expression; specifically, academic communalism will be investigated, which can be seen as an interdependent culture of attitudes, beliefs, and values within a learning environment. With the use of the Academic Communalism Scale, the…

The Learning Communities Demonstration is a national research project that is testing the effectiveness of learning communities in six community colleges across the United States: Merced College in California; The Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC) in Baltimore, Maryland; Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, Florida; Houston…

Postsecondary remediation is a controversial topic. On one hand, it fills an important and sizeable niche in higher education. On the other hand, critics argue that it wastes tax dollars, diminishes academic standards, and demoralizes faculty. Yet, despite the ongoing debate, few comprehensive, large-scale, multi-institutional evaluations of…

In this study, we compared self-revised essays to timed writing exams written by students in a developmental English course in a community college. Using a multiple-trait rubric, we found that self-revised essays showed greater elaboration than timed writing exams, and that elaboration and focus correlated only for self-revised essays. We argue,…

Background/Context: Twenty percent of first-year students in public 4-year institutions and 42% of first-year students in public 2-year institutions in the United States enroll in remedial courses. Yet despite widespread remediation across U.S. colleges and universities, there remains a great deal of uncertainty about how remedial courses develop…

The State of Florida Department of Education provides pre-and-post-graduation data for public high school graduates throughout Florida. These data were used for the present report to produce data sets for all M-DCPS regular high schools and charter high schools graduating students in 2009 and 2010. Summary data for the district are also provided.…

Developmental Education programs are designed to provide assistance to students who are academically under-prepared for college-level coursework. Previous issues of "Data Notes" compared the outcomes of developmental students completing all of their required developmental courses to those not requiring developmental education. Using data…

A study was conducted to compare remedial/developmental programs of study in the community college system of Kansas with those offered by the state's university system for the fiscal year 1985. Study findings included the following: (1) all of the Regents' universities and all of the state's community colleges offered remedial/developmental…

Compares attrition rates for students in a developmental science course to those for students with the same standardized Science Inventory scores who did not enroll in the developmental section. Indicates that students who completed the developmental science course had a higher rate of success than students who did not. (MAB)

The State of Florida Department of Education provides pre-and-post-graduation data for public high school graduates throughout Florida. These data were used for the present report to produce data sets for all M-DCPS regular high schools and charter high schools graduating students in 2008 and 2009. Summary data for the district are also provided.…

A study was conducted at Evergreen Valley College (EVC) to examine the effects of remedial English and English as a Second Language (ESL) instruction on student persistence. All new fall 1982 day students without prior college experience (N=1,264) were divided into three groups: English students, ESL students, and students who took no placement…

Compares outcomes in developmental mathematics classes that used lectures with classes that utilized computer-mediated instruction. Finds that the results showed no significant differences on common exams. States that course satisfaction levels, however, were higher in computer-mediated classes, partly because students wanted greater control over…

In 1997, Florida's St. Petersburg Junior College (SPJC) conducted a study to determine whether students who needed remediation completed their degree programs and, if so, the time that they took to complete their program. The academic records of students who graduated in summer 1995, fall 1995, and spring 1996 were analyzed, with findings compared…