State community college systems and their two-year colleges have spent the 2010s re-examining and redesigning decades-old developmental education tracks to ensure students get what they need — and only what they need — with an eye toward moving them more quickly into college-level courses and, eventually, the degree or certificate they want.
Administrators and faculty have worked together statewide and at individual institutions to redesign curriculum in a way that accomplishes this central goal without sacrificing learning, particularly for those from “at-risk” backgrounds, while gaining buy-in from skeptical faculty, ensuring they don’t lose revenue in the process and making adjustments along the way. Common themes include shortened or “module-ized” courses, more targeted placement tests, inclusive processes that include faculty and other stakeholders, and the prospect of making up lost developmental education revenue as students show greater persistence.
This excerpt comes from the current issue of AACC’s Community College Journal.
In Virginia, evidence collected nearly a decade ago by the Community College Research Center shows how unreliable developmental education placement tests were at that time, and how few students who placed into the lowest levels of developmental math, in particular, completed their degrees, says Sharon Morrissey, vice chancellor of academic services and research for the Virginia Community College System.
“That was very compelling evidence,” she says. “In sharing it with college leaders, it didn’t take a lot of persuasion to say, ‘We’ve got to do something about this.’ Students are coming to us because they want a college education, a better salary, a better life. And we thought we were creating a very important support system for them. Instead, we were creating this Bermuda Triangle that they sunk into and never came out of.”
Teaming with faculty
To ensure broad buy-in from faculty, staff and students, in addition to administration, Minnesota State Colleges and Universities created a task force four years ago to examine who was doing what, what was working, what were some of the barriers, and what the system could do to advance developmental education, says Pakou Yang, director of P-20 and college readiness for the system, which contains 30 community and technical colleges and seven state universities, not including the University of Minnesota.
“The faculty involvement from the beginning created momentum and buy-in — we have faculty members who are our champions and lead our work,” she says. “Our student leaders also have been an integral part of this. This impacts our students, so it’s important that they were a part of this conversation. And developmental education is about more than courses — it’s about creating integrated programming. So having people from all parts of our campuses involved in this work was critical.”
In Florida, colleges were already examining data and piloting different programs when the state legislature passed Senate Bill 1720 in 2013. That legislation required colleges to redesign developmental education if they hadn’t already — and gave students the choice to opt out and go straight to a gateway course, says Madeline Pumariega, chancellor of the Florida College System.
