West Virginia Code §18B-1D-8 statutorily mandates the West Virginia Higher Education Report Card (Report Card). This annual accountability report provides year-end higher education statistics for both of the state's higher education systems, the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission (Commission) and West Virginia Council for Community…

This paper is a literature review that explores the nature and effectiveness of contextualization as a way to improve outcomes for academically underprepared college students. Two forms of contextualization have been studied: "contextualized" and "integrated" instruction. There is more descriptive work on the contextualization of basic skills than…

Earning a college degree increases a person's life outcomes in income, employment, health, and quality of life. The average person with a bachelor's degree earns almost twice as much as a high school graduate and nearly triple that of someone who did not finish high school. The unemployment rate for people with bachelor's degrees is about…

Introduction: This prospective longitudinal study examined several selected family- and school-related factors simultaneously in order to investigate the importance of well known and less examined predictors of educational attainment. Method: The participants were 844 (486 girls) nine-, 12-, and 15-years old comprehensive school students. Family-…

This investigation was a case study to measure the retention and persistence effects of a learning community in developmental English at an urban community college. The study used student demographic and course outcome data to quantify the extent to which learning community participation could contribute toward remedying the historically low…

Many students taking remedial courses in college are not doing well in them. A better approach is needed that will benefit not only students, but also taxpayers and the students who are footing the bill for unsuccessful instruction. A subscription-based model in which students can work at their own pace and get help from readily available faculty…

The authors first explore the changing European society and its impact on higher education. This forms a background to the main focus of the paper--the effectiveness of remedial or developmental education. The paper then provides an overview of the core elements of successful remedial or developmental courses and summarizes developments in online…

In this Brief the authors first report on evidence about the effectiveness (or, unfortunately, in too many cases, the ineffectiveness) of remediation and then provide information about the progression of students through the developmental sequence. They discuss problems associated with the crucial assessments and make a brief statement about…

Although "access" to higher education has increased substantially over the past forty years, student "success" in college--as measured by persistence and degree attainment--has not improved at all. Thomas Brock reviews systematic research findings on the effectiveness of various interventions designed to help at-risk students remain in college.…

While community colleges serve as a postsecondary entry point for many "at-risk" students, not many who enroll will be ready or able to participate in college level courses on entry. Statistically, large numbers of community college students require college remediation, and only a handful are able to successfully emerge from the…

Across the United States, community colleges offer millions of students an open-access, low-cost postsecondary education. However, of the students who enroll in community college hoping to earn a credential or transfer to a four-year institution, only about half achieve their goal within six years. For students who enter college needing…

Using data from the Virginia Community College System and building upon prior Florida-based research, this study examines whether student success course enrollment has positive associations with shorter term student outcomes, including earning any college credits within the first year and persisting into the second year. The present study finds…

Private for-profit institutions have been the fastest growing part of the U.S. higher education sector. For-profit enrollment increased from 0.2 percent to 9.1 percent of total enrollment in degree-granting schools from 1970 to 2009, and for-profit institutions account for the majority of enrollments in non-degree granting postsecondary schools.…

We use a regression discontinuity strategy to produce causal estimates for the effect of remediation under Florida's test-based promotion policy on multiple outcomes for up to five years after the intervention. Students subjected to the policy were retained in the third grade, were required to be assigned to a high-quality teacher during the…

A previous working paper argued, that, to understand basic skills education, it is necessary to observe classrooms to see what the "instructional triangle" involving the instructor, students, and content is like. This working paper presents the results of observing classes in 13 community colleges. It starts with a conceptualization of…