college readiness and high school study

8/22/2019 College Readiness and High School Study

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Te Mathematics and English LiteracyRequired of First YearCommunity College Students

What Does It Really Mean to BeCollege and Work Ready?

EXECUT IVE SUMMAR Y

A Report from the National Center on Education and the Economy

May 2013


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National Center on Education and the Economy

2000 Pennsylvania Avenue, NWSuite 5300

Washington, DC 20006

(202) 379-1800www.ncee.org

Copyright 2013 by the National Centeron Education and the Economy

Te National Center on Education and the Economy was createdin 1988 to analyze the implications of changes in the international

economy for American education, formulate an agenda for American

education based on that analysis and seek wherever possible toaccomplish that agenda through policy change and development of

the resources educators would need to carry it out.
http://www.ncee.org/http://www.ncee.org/


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Te nation is, at long last, engaged in a serious discussion of whatit might take to make sure that our students leave high schoolcollege and career ready. But what exactly, does that mean? Almostthree years ago, we decided to nd out, by looking at the levels ofmathematics and English language literacy high school graduatesneed to succeed in their rst year in our community colleges.

Why focus on community colleges? About

45 percent of US college students are in theseinstitutions. Tey provide most of the vocational

education done in this country, and are thereforethe main gateway to work requiring solid training,

but not a four-year degree. Half of the students in

these institutions are in programs designed to enablethem to transfer to four-year colleges. So community

colleges are also a main pathway to four-yearcolleges. Since a large fraction of community college

students enrolled in the general studies track go onto four-year colleges, it is clear that for a substantial

majority of high school graduates, being ready to besuccessful in the rst year of a typical community

college program is tantamount to being ready forboth college and work.

Tere was, of course, no shortage of opinions aboutwhat it might take to succeed in the rst year ofcommunity college, but much of it was based on

asking panels of college faculty for the answer.Tis method of determining education standards,however, is notoriously faulty, because educators,

job foremen and others presumably in a position toknow typically answer based on what they would

like students and workers to know and be able to do,

not what the program of study or the work actuallyrequires. We quickly discovered that no one had

done in-depth research on what was needed to besuccessful in our community colleges.

So we set in motion two empirical studies, one

focused on English and the other on mathematicsrequirements. Te results run counter to some widely

held opinions that turn out to be just plain wrong inthe light of our ndings.

But these ndings will not surprise everyone. Asthe facts presented in these reports came to light

in the course of our research, we shared themwith people very close to the institutions we were

researching. Few of them were surprised. Mosttold us that the emerging picture corresponded

closely to what they saw every day in the eld.Tey had long ago concluded that the debate about

standards was unhinged from the realities in ourcommunity colleges.

We oer these research reports in the hope that our

ndings will enable our schools to make the changesin school curriculum and instruction needed to

enable our students to be much more successful in

DEAR COLLEAGUE

T h e M a T h e M a T i c s a n d e n g l i s h l i T e r a c y r e q u i r e d o f f i r s T y e a r c o M M u n i T y c o l l e g e s T u d e n T s


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college and in the careers they choose for themselves.But there are important implications here for the

Common Core State Standards, for communitycolleges and for the institutions that educate and

train our teachers as well as for employers.

Some may say that our ndings constitute anargument to lower high school leaving standards.

Tat would be a gross misreading of our ndings.For most of our students, those high standards

in mathematics constitute a requirement to learnmaterial they will never need, either in college or

later in their work, a bit like the requirement acentury ago to learn Latin in high school. A fair

reading of these reports will conclude that, both inEnglish literacy and mathematics, both the schoolsand our community colleges will have to help their

students reach for dierent kinds of targets and, atthe same time, achieve at much higher levels than

they do now.

Many will be very surprised at how little is actuallydemanded of our rst year community college

students. Te natural reaction would be to call forraising the standards in our community colleges

substantially. But we would urge caution here.Tey must, over time, be raisedgreatly raised in

factbut it is very important to bear in mind that alarge fraction of high school graduates cannot now

do the work required of them in the rst year ofthe typical community college program. Our rstpriority should be to enable all high school students

to succeed against the current community collegestandards, before we raise the bar even further.

What these studies show is that our schools do not

teach what their students need, while demanding ofthem what they dont need; furthermore, the skills

that we do teach and that the students do need, theschools teach ineectively. Perhaps that is where we

should begin.

Each of these studies was guided by a panelof leading experts in that subject matter area,including key gures from the community

colleges themselves, as well as leading subjectmatter experts and researchers. Both studies were

overseen by our echnical Advisory Committee,whose members include many of the nations

leading psychometricians, cognitive scientists, andcurriculum experts. We are deeply indebted to boththe subject matter Panels and the echnical Advisory

Committee for the time and careful attention theyhave given to these studies over the two-and-a-

half years it has taken to conduct them. Specialappreciation goes to the Mathematics Panel co-

chairs, Phil Daro and Sol Garfunkel and the EnglishPanel co-chairs, Richard P. Durn, Sally Hampton

and Catherine E. Snow, for their leadership,thoughtfulness and creativity in steering these Panels

through the challenging tasks we set before them.

Most of the work, as is usually the case, was done bythe sta. Betsy Brown Ruzzi, NCEEs Vice-President

for Programs, produced the original research design

and has continued to be deeply involved in the work.Jackie Kraemer, Senior Policy Analyst, conducted theresearch. Jennifer Craw, Production Designer andWebmaster, assembled and aggregated all the data

coding and developed the data displays. David R.Mandel, Director of Research and Policy Analysis,

oversaw the whole process and played a key role indrafting the reports. And many thanks to Suzie

Sullivan, Director of Administration, for her keeneye as we prepared the report.

We are deeply grateful for the support andencouragement of the Bill & Melinda GatesFoundation, which funded this eort as part of their

College Ready Education strategy.

Marc Tucker, President

National Center on Education and the Economy

ii W h a T d o e s i T r e a l l y M e a n T o B e c o l l e g e a n d W o r k r e a d y ?


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T h E R E i s A s T R O n G C O n s E n s U s thatstudents ought to leave high school ready for both

college and careers. But what, exactly, does thatmean? As far as we know, this report is the result

of the rst attempt to answer that question withempirical research.

We focused that research on the requirements of

community colleges, because, by doing so, we canprovide a very concrete image of what it means to be

college and career ready. A very large fraction ofour high school graduates attend these institutions,

which some have described as the workhorse of ourpostsecondary education system. Our communitycolleges provide not only a gateway to the nations

four-year colleges for a large and increasing fractionof our students, but also the bulk of the serious

vocational and technical education taking placein the United States below the baccalaureate level,

for everyone from auto mechanics and nurses toemergency medical technicians and police ocers. If

a student cannot successfully complete a communitycollege two-year certicate or degree program

leading directly to such a job, that student will have avery hard time supporting a family above the poverty

line. So it is reasonable to say that if a student leaveshigh school unable to succeed in the initial credit-

bearing courses in their local community college,

that student is ready neither for work nor college.And we know that, in fact, a large proportion of

our high school graduates are indeed unable tosucceed in their rst year in community college. So

this report addresses a simple question: what kindand level of literacy in mathematics and English is

required of a high school graduate if that student isgoing to have a good chance of succeeding in the

rst year of a typical community college program?

One would think that the answer to that questionwould be well known, but it is not. Community

college sta have been asked for their opinions onthat point, but people who study the process ofsetting standards of this sort know that, irrespective

of how they are instructed, people who are askedsuch questions typically answer based on what they

would like students to know and be able to do, ratherthan on what the actual work demands.

We present here an empirical analysis of themathematics and English literacy skills neededin a range of initial required community college

introductory courses in a diverse range of programsof study.

i. sUmm ARyi. sUmm ARy



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We began this research by randomly selecting acommunity college from each of seven states andthen focusing on the most popular and diverse

programs in those colleges - Accounting, Automotiveechnology, Biotech/Electrical echnology, Business,

Criminal Justice, Early Childhood Education,Information echnology/Computer Programming1

and Nursing - plus the General rack.2

For mathematics, we collected data on themathematics that are actually taught in the initial

credit bearing courses in those programs, and in the

1WhiletherearedistinctdifferencesinthecurriculaoftheInforma-

tionTechnologyandComputerProgrammingcoursesweencoun-

tered,thecharacterofthetextstheyemployarequitesimilarso

theyhavebeenjoinedtogetherforanalyticalpurposes.

2Aboutone-thirdofcommunitycollegestudentswhograduate

choosetomajorintheliberalartsandsciences,generalstudies

and/orhumanities,agurethathasremainedsteadyoverthelast

decade. Thenextmostpopularmajorsareinthehealthprofes-

sionsandrelatedclinicalsciences,whichencompassabout21%

ofallassociatedegreesgranted. Businessisanotherpopular

major,drawing15.7%ofcommunitycollegestudents,followed

byengineeringat6.5%. Securityandprotectiveservicesand

computerandinformationservicesroundoutthemostpopular

majorswith4.4%and3.8%ofstudentschoosingtheseelds,

respectively. Whilehealtheldshaveexperiencedanincreasein

graduatesbetweenthe1999-00and2009-10schoolyears(from

15.3%to20.9%),engineeringhasdroppedfrom10.5%ofgradu-

atestojust6.5%. Mostothereldshaveremainedfairlystable.

(NCES,Condition of Education, 2012,(2012).Washington,DC)

initial mathematics courses these programs requirestudents to take. We did this by analyzing thetextbooks and exams and other work assignments

used in these courses. For English, we collectedmaterials, including graded student assignments,

tests and examinations from each college to allowus to analyze the reading and writing skills that are

required in the initial credit-bearing courses in thoseprograms, and in the rst year English Composition

course required by each program. We also analyzedthe reading levels needed to understand the material

in the textbooks used in those courses.

2 W h a T d o e s i T r e a l l y M e a n T o B e c o l l e g e a n d W o r k r e a d y ?


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O n L y O n E p R O G R A m in one college required

entering students to have mastered the contentof Algebra II before enrolling in that program.

Algebra II is an integral element in the sequence ofmathematics courses that are required of students

who will go on to take calculus and to use calculusin their work, but that is true of only about ve

percent of the working population.3

Indeed, community college rst year programsof study typically assume that students have not

mastered Algebra I. Te most advanced mathematicscontent used in the vast majority of the rst-year

college programs we analyzed can reasonably becharacterized as the mathematics associated with

Algebra 1.25, that is some, but not all, of the topicsusually associated with Algebra I, plus a few othertopics, mostly related to geometry or statistics. Most

of the mathematics that is required of students beforebeginning these college courses and the mathematics

that most enables students to be successful in collegecourses is not high school mathematics, but middle

school mathematics, especially arithmetic, ratio,proportion, expressions and simple equations.

Considering the importance of middle school

mathematics content, it should be of real concernthat a large proportion of our high school graduates

do not have a sound command of this fundamental

aspect of mathematics. We also found that many

3 SeeAnthonyP.Carnevale,NicoleSmithandMichelleMelton,

STEM(Washington,DC:CenteronEducationandtheWorkforce,

GeorgetownUniversity,2011)

students, to be successful in our community colleges,

need to be competent in some areas of mathematicsthat are rarely taught in our elementary or secondary

schools, such as schematics, geometric visualizationand complex applications of measurement.

In sum, a substantial part of the high school

mathematics we teach is mathematics that moststudents do not need, some of what is needed in the

rst year of community college is not taught in ourschools, and the mathematics that is most needed

by our community college students is actuallyelementary and middle school mathematics that isnot learned well enough by many to enable them to

succeed in community college. A signicant bodyof research on teacher knowledge, including the

work of Liping Ma, Jim Stigler and Deborah Ball,makes it clear that one reason for this is because

the instruction in arithmetic, ratio, proportion,expressions and simple equations that our teachers

have received in school and in college falls far shortof what it needs to be for them to have a sound

conceptual grasp of the mathematics they are askedto teach.4

4Arecentadditiontothisbodyofknowledgethatexamineswhat

developmentalmathematicsstudentsincommunitycollegeactu-

allyunderstandaboutmathematics(JamesW.Stigler,KarenB.

GivvinandBelindaJ.Thompson,WhatCommunityCollegeDevel-

opmentalMathematicsStudentsUnderstandaboutMathematics,MathAMATYC Educator,v1n3(May2010):p4-16)reinforcesprior

ndingsthatthedominanceofattentiontoprocedureinK-12

mathematicseducationaccompaniedbylackoffocusonconcep-

tualunderstandingcontributessignicantlytostudentsstruggling

withmiddleschoolmathematicsandearlyalgebraincollege.

ThE F inD inGs FOR

mAThEmATiCs L iTERACy



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We conclude the following:

1 . Many community college career programsdemand little or no use of mathematics. othe extent that they do use mathematics, the

mathematics needed by rst year studentsin these courses is almost exclusively middle

school mathematics. But the failure rates in ourcommunity colleges suggest that many of them

do not know that math very well. A very highpriority should be given to the improvement

of the teaching of proportional relationshipsincluding percent, graphical representations,

functions, and expressions and equations in ourschools, including their application to concrete

practical problems.

2 . Whatever students did to pass mathematicscourses in middle school, it does not appear to

require learning the concepts in any durableway. While they may have been taught the

appropriate procedures for solving certainstandard problems, the high rates of non-

completion by the signicant percentages ofstudents who arrive at college with the mostmodest command of mathematics suggests that

there are signicant weaknesses in teaching theconcepts on which these procedures are based.

Tis is a very serious problem that needs tobe addressed in the rst instance by the way

mathematics is taught to prospective teachersof elementary and middle school mathematics

in the arts and sciences departments of ouruniversities and the way mathematics education

is taught in our schools of education.

3 . It makes no sense to rush through the middleschool mathematics curriculum in order to get

to advanced algebra as rapidly as possible. Given

the strong evidence that mastery of middleschool mathematics plays a very importantrole in college and career success,5 strong

consideration should be given to spendingmore time, not less, on the mastery of middle

5 SeeStigler,GivvenandThompsonandthendingsofthemath-

ematicsgainingthegreatestattentioninthecommunitycollege

majorsthatcomprisetheheartofthisstudy.

school mathematics, and requiring students tomaster Algebra I no later than the end of theirsophomore year in high school, rather than by

the end of middle school. Tis recommendationshould be read in combination with the

preceding one. Spending more time on middleschool mathematics is in fact a recommendation

to spend more time making sure that studentsunderstand the concepts on which all subsequent

mathematics is based. It does little good to pushfor teaching more advanced topics at lower grade

levels if the students grasp of the underlyingconcepts is so weak that they cannot do the

mathematics. Once students understand thebasic concepts thoroughly, they should be ableto learn whatever mathematics they need for

the path they subsequently want to pursue morequickly and easily than they can now.

4 . Mastery of Algebra II is widely thought to be aprerequisite for success in college and careers.

Our research shows that that is not so. Temost demanding mathematics courses typically

required of community college students arethose required by the mathematics department,

not the career major, but the content of therst year mathematics courses oered by thecommunity colleges mathematics department

is typically the content usually associated withAlgebra I, some Algebra II and a few topics in

geometry. It cannot be the case that one mustknow Algebra II in order to study Algebra I or

Algebra II. Based on our data, one cannot makethe case that high school graduates must be

procient in Algebra II to be ready for collegeand careers.

Te high school mathematics curriculum is now

centered on the teaching of a sequence of courses

leading to calculus that includes Geometry,Algebra II, Pre-Calculus and Calculus. However,

fewer than ve percent of American workersand an even smaller percentage of community

college students will ever need to master thecourses in this sequence in their college or in the



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workplace.6 Tere is a clear case for includingthe topics in this sequence in the high schoolcurriculum as an option for students who

plan to go into careers demanding mastery ofthese subjects, but they should not be required

courses in our high schools. o require thesecourses in high school is to deny to many

students the opportunity to graduate high schoolbecause they have not mastered a sequence of

mathematics courses they will never need. Inthe face of these ndings, the policy of requiring

a passing score on an Algebra II exam for highschool graduation simply cannot be justied.

5 . Our research shows that many of the most

popular community college programs leading towell-paying careers require mathematics that is

not now included in the mainstream high schoolmathematics program, including mathematical

modeling (how to frame a real-world problem inmathematical terms), statistics and probability.

Our research also shows that success in manycommunity college programs demands masteryof certain topics in mathematics that are

rarely, if ever, taught in American elementaryand secondary schools, including complex

applications of measurement, geometricvisualization and schematic diagrams. American

high schools should consider abandoning therequirement that all high school students study

a program of mathematics leading to calculusand instead oer that mathematics program

as one among a number of options availablefor high school students in mathematics, with

other options available (e.g., statistics, dataanalysis and applied geometry) that include the

mathematics needed by workers in other clustersof occupations. By doing so high schools willalmost certainly expand opportunity to many

students who now nd success in college closedo by a one-size-ts-all sequence of mathematics

topics that actually ts the requirements only fora very narrow range of occupations.

6 SeeAnthonyP.Carnevale,NicoleSmithandMichelleMelton,

STEM(Washington,DC:CenteronEducationandtheWorkforce,

GeorgetownUniversity,2011)fortheirforecastofthegrowing

percentageofSTEMjobs,notallofwhichwillrequirecalculus.

6 . Te research we did revealed a major gap in thealignment between the mathematics coursestaught in the mathematics departments in

our community colleges and the mathematicsactually needed to be successful in the applied

programs students are taking. In some of thecases we observed, the departments oering

the applied programs apparently felt compelledto create their own mathematics courses rather

than require a course in the mathematicsdepartment. In a great many cases, the

mathematics department course had little ornothing to do with the actual mathematics

required to be successful in the applied programsthe students were enrolled in. It may well bethat many community college students are

denied a certicate or diploma because theyhave failed in a mathematics course focused on

mathematics topics that are irrelevant to thework these students plan to do or the courses

they need to take to learn how to do that work.Tat strikes us as unfair. Because this is true

and because we also noted that students in theapplied programs often need mathematics that

was never oered in high school or in college,we think the community colleges need to review

their mathematics requirements in the light ofwhat has been learned about what students need

to know about mathematics to be successful inthe careers they have chosen.

7. Like the standard high school mathematicssequence, the placement tests that community

colleges use to determine whether students willbe allowed to register for credit-bearing coursesor be directed instead to take remedial courses in

mathematics are based on the assumption thatall students should be expected to be procient

in the sequence of courses leading to calculus,

in particular that they should be expected to beprocient in the content typically associated withAlgebra I, Algebra II and Geometry. But our

research, as we have noted, shows that studentsdo not need to be procient in most of the topics

typically associated with Algebra II and muchof Geometry to be successful in most programs

oered by the community colleges. Tis is a veryserious issue. It is clear that many students are



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being denied entry to credit-bearing courses atour community colleges who are in fact preparedto do the mathematics that will be required of

them in their applied programs.

A very large proportion of students who enrollin remedial programs fail to get a degree or

certicate, whether or not they complete theirremedial programs. It follows that a large

fraction of students applying to our communitycolleges are needlessly running up debt taking

remedial courses they do not need to take tobe successful in the applied programs of their

choice, and are, in the process, being deniedaccess to the programs that could make allthe dierence between rewarding careers and

lives on the one hand and lives of poverty andfrustration on the other. Te research showing

that many students who fail their placementtests in mathematics, but go on to be successful

in community college, makes the point. 7

8 . While the textbooks in the introductory

program courses were often impressive in theirdemand for mathematical thinking, the tests

were a dierent story. Judging by the testscommunity college teachers administer to their

students in the introductory program courses in

their career majors, their courses are typicallypitched to the lower set of expectations described

by Blooms hierarchymemorization of factsand mastery of proceduresand not to the

kinds of analytical skills, writing ability, abilityto synthesize material to put together solutions

to problems the student has not seen before,

7CliveBeleldandPeterM.Crosta,Predicting Success in College:

The Importance of Placement Tests and High School Transcripts,

(NewYork:CommunityCollegeResearchCenter,2012)andJudith

ScottClayton,Do High Stakes Placement Exams Predict College

Success?(NewYork:CommunityCollegeResearchCenter,2012).

and other complex skills that employers arenow demanding. Community colleges needto review their course and program objectives

in the light of current employer demands tomake sure that they are helping their students

develop the kinds of skills that will make theirgraduates employable.

9 . What is tested by community college instructors

typically falls far short of what is contained inthe texts those teachers assign to their students.

Judging by what is tested by community collegeteachers, they do not typically appear to be

requiring students to apply mathematics or evento think mathematically when the text they

have chosen for the courses uses math to explainrelevant phenomena or presents mathematical

skills as an important element in the skillsrequired to do the work. It is not clear whether

this is because the teachers do not think thatthat material is in fact needed to be successfulin the eld the student has chosen or because,

although they do think it is needed, they donot think their students capable of learning the

material. Tis, too, is a very important issue.If it is the case that many community college

teachers are teaching less material than theythink is actually needed or teaching material at

a lower level than they think the work actuallydemands, because they do not believe their

students can absorb the material they actuallyneed to absorb, then our community colleges

are shortchanging our students and this problemneeds to be addressed.



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W E F O U n D T h A T the reading and writing

currently required of students in initial credit-bearing courses in community colleges is not very

complex or cognitively demanding. While theinformation load of texts students encounter in

community colleges is considerably more demandingthan of those assigned in high school, students

are not expected to make much use of those texts.Te requirements for writing are marginal at best

and the performance levels students are expectedto meet with respect to reading are in many casessurprisingly modest.

It turns out that the reading complexity of college

texts used in initial courses in community colleges issomewhere between the level of grade 11 and grade

12. One would think that this means that the level ofthe community college texts is comparable to the level

of a students high school text and would thereforepresent no challenge to their reading ability. But that

does not seem to be the case. wo things point in thisdirection. First, the high failure rates that students

experience in community college suggest that thesetexts are too dicult for many of them to handle.

Second, there are an accumulating number of studiesof high school texts that point to their diminished

level of challenge over the past half century at thesame time as the demands of college texts are holdingsteady or increasing.8 aken together they suggest

that high school students typically confront texts thatfall short of those rated at grade 11 or 12.

8ACT,ACT National Curriculum Survey(IowaCity,IA:ACT,2009).

CommonCoreStateStandardsInitiative(2011). Common Core

State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy in History/

Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects, Appendix A:

Research Supporting Key Elements of the Standards.Washington,

DC:NationalGovernorsAssociationCenterforBestPracticeand

CouncilofChiefStateSchoolOfcers.

Our text complexity study noted that students who

will be successful readers of information-rich textswritten at the 11th or 12th grade level must possess the

following capacities:

Te ability to read complex texts inunsupported environments;

Te capacity to process, retain and synthesize

large amounts of new information;

Signicant reading experience in a wide rangeof content areas; and

Te ability to read and understand tables,

charts, maps, lists and other documents thatsupplement the prose in many college texts.

Many students emerge from high school withoutthese capacities and experiences because readingfor in-depth subject matter comprehension is not

formally taught in most high schools and the readingthat is required more often than not demands littlemore than searching for basic facts as opposed to

trying to make sense of complex or conicting ideasor both. Te reading that is assigned in high schools

is also drawn from much less complex texts thanare found in community college, particularly in

college courses focusing on technical areas such as

information technology and automotive technology.exts in these elds require the ability to read andunderstand technical vocabulary, charts and other

visual representations of physical and mechanicalphenomena not typically taught in high school

outside of career and technical education courses. Inmany cases it is not that students might not comeacross such material, it is that they are rarely called

on to engage with it. Tis disconnect between high

ThE F inD inGs FOR

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school and college reading demands is particularlytroubling and suggests a need to reexamine whatis taught in high school. Te Common Core State

Standards in English Language Arts (CCSSE)address reading in history/social studies as well as

science and technical subjects, and in so doing mayincrease the relevance of high school instruction.

While the reading complexity of rst-year

community college texts is between 11th and 12thgrade levels, we found that community college

instructors typically make limited use of the textsthey assign and use many aids (e.g., PowerPoint

presentations, videos, outlines, ashcards) to helpstudents understand the key points of the sections of

the text they are asked to read. It would appear thatstudents inability to read texts of the level assigned

does not inhibit their success in their programs. Isthis because the material in the texts is irrelevant

to later success in education and careers, or becausethe instructors oer workarounds, recognizing theirstudents limited reading ability?9

Te Programme for International StudentAssessment (PISA) analytical framework used by the

studys English Panel to analyze the level of readingchallenge makes a distinction between retrieval

tasks those that require a reader simply to nd

information and make basic interpretations of it and analytic/synthetic tasks, that require the reader

to reect on and evaluate what they have read.

Overall, we found that most of what rst-yearcommunity college students are required to do

falls in the former category. Only the EnglishComposition classes reliably assign tasks that

require students to reect on and evaluate whatthey have read.

Te study also analyzed the reading and writingrequirements found in tests and examinations ininitial credit bearing community college courses.

In this case, we found that most assessments incommunity colleges come in the form of multiple-

9Oneexplanationofwhatisoccurringisthattherehasbeenanele-

mentofpedagogicalsurrenderoccurringoncollegecampuses.

Whereonce(mid-'80stolate'90s)theytaughttothemiddle,

nowtheyteachtothebase.

choice questions that demand very little in the wayof complex reading skills and no writing.

Our analysis of the writing required to succeed ininitial credit bearing courses in community college

revealed that most introductory college classesdemand very little writing; when writing is required,

instructors tend to have very low expectations forgrammatical accuracy, appropriate diction, clarity

of expression, reasoning and the ability to present alogical argument or oer evidence in support

of claims.

o the extent that writing is required in initialcredit-bearing courses, it typically takes the form of

informational writing or marshaling evidence fortaking a particular course of action tied to a course-

relevant profession. For example, lling in an autorepair order form, completing a pre-school classobservation form, reporting engine analysis ndings,

writing up treatment notes for a nursing patient, ormaking an argument for taking a particular action

on the basis of criminal justice system data. Butthis kind of writing gets the most modest attention

in high schools, where literary analysis plays asignicant role. However, even more worrying than

how the balance is struck between dierent formsof writing in high school is that so little writing of

any kind is assigned. Across various content areaclasses, the default is short form assignments that

require neither breadth nor depth of knowledge.Furthermore, the quality of instruction, especially

with regard to argument, falls far short of whatstudents need.10 Te good news here is that theCCSSE has recognized this problem and set out toaddress it by spelling out a much more ambitious

approach to teaching writing, starting in theelementary grades and extending into secondary

schools. But applauding new standards is not the

same as enacting them. Serious attention at the stateand local level to bridging the gap between wherewe are and where we need to be must follow and this

should include greater attention to writing in teachereducation programs across the board.

10Applebee,A.N.andLanger,J.A.(2011).ASnapshotofWriting

InstructioninMiddleSchoolsandHighSchools,English Journal,

100.6:pp.14-27.



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With the exception of English Composition classes,complex writing plays a minor role in communitycollege student exams. When writing is assigned

in exams, the emphasis in grading is on the leastcognitively demanding aspects of writing. At almost

every turn one nds the weakness of high schoolwriting being reinforced in community colleges

when just the opposite ought to be the order of theday. aken together this suggests that community

college could be a much more rewarding experiencefor students were it not for the weak preparation

that precedes college and the modest expectationsstudents encounter during their stay.

We have noted that community college instructors

do not expect their students to be able to read atthe level of their texts or to write very much at all,suggesting that those instructors have very low

expectations for their students, expectations so low asto deny many, if not most, students the opportunity

to learn skills essential to the careers they havechosen to pursue. Conversely, we have also pointed

out that nothing in the high school curriculumprepares students for some of what is expected in our

community colleges.

Tis study of initial credit-bearing courses incommunity colleges suggests that only modest

reading and writing demands are placed on studentsin these courses. While texts assigned include

content at about an 11th or 12th grade reading

level, which is signicantly more challenging thanwhat they typically encounter in high school, thelevel of processing of those texts required by the

assigned tasks is, at best, only modestly challengingin most courses. Te one exception was English

Composition, where high challenge levels arecommon. Students in the community colleges

we studied are asked to retrieve information and

sometimes integrate information from dierent textsin their writing, but only a few courses, outside ofEnglish Composition classes, ask students to reect

on and analyze what they read.

Reading and understanding technical vocabulary isa necessary skill in many of the initial credit bearing

courses analyzed. While students will not likelyencounter such vocabulary in high school, experience

in high school with navigating texts in unfamiliar

subjects, including texts that contain technicalvocabulary of some type, would better prepare them

for the demands of college. Consistent with thisidea is identication by the CCSSE of reading in

technical subjects as an important learning objective.Consequently, placing some greater emphasis onliteracy with graphical representations and other

technical means of communication seems like asensible strategy for high schools to consider.

English Composition courses in our community

colleges focus on teaching students the dierentgenres of writing needed in college, but many of the

courses specic to the industry clusters never giveany writing assignments or assign types of writing

that might help students develop the writing skillsneeded for that industry. In addition, far too many

of these classes rely primarily on multiple choicetests to assess students command of knowledge,

thus communicating that writing ability is notreally needed. Aside from sending a false signal tostudents, this shouldnt be read as an excuse for

anyone being satised with the meager amount ofwriting students are assigned in high school. In

the rst instance, most students will be taking anEnglish Composition course and not giving adequate

attention to writing in high school is a recipe for

trouble in this course and in subsequent collegecourses students might take. Secondly, it is a recipefor trouble in the workforce and for participation in

civil society.

We found considerable evidence suggesting thatmany of the decits of secondary school language

arts instruction are being replicated rather thanremedied in community college teaching. Te

writing tasks assigned in these community collegeprograms are of low challenge, students writing

skills are rarely assessed, and expectations forstudent writing, especially of arguments, are low.Our community college students clearly need better

instruction in constructing arguments and in layingout their thinking logically and persuasively. Such

writing is at the heart of learning in college to saynothing of its essential role in many workplaces. It

pushes students to gain command of the subjectsthey are studying, to think critically about the



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strengths and weaknesses of dierent points of view,to anticipate counterarguments, and to express theirndings clearly and persuasively. Te target for

student competence in this aspect of literacy in bothour high schools and colleges needs to be raised if

our students are to have a future with promise thatthey all deserve. Te call of the Common Core State

Standards for strengthened instruction in this area isa sound rst step in this direction.

A Final Note

Te response that many of our readers would nodoubt expect from the Panels that helped produce

this study is to demand that community collegesraise their expectations for students in mathematics,

reading and writing at least to the point thatstudents be expected to read the texts they are given,

do the mathematics presented in those texts andwrite material appropriate to the careers they have

chosen at a level that goes beyond the simplest recallof facts to embrace the kinds of analysis expected ofthem on the job. And further, that the high schools

be expected to prepare these students to meet suchstandards and to provide the foundation skills

required for their graduates to exercise the skillsfor which currently no foundation is provided in

high school.

Yes, but a note of caution is in order. We need tobear in mind that a very large fraction of high school

graduates does not meet the very low expectationsthat community colleges currently have of

them. Te nation may have to learn to walk beforeit runs, which means that it is important, rst, to

enable our high school students to meet the currentvery low standards before we ratchet those standards

up. Nothing in this stance, however, should prevent

high schools from providing the skills needed to dothe kind of mathematics, reading and writing now

demanded by our community colleges for whichno foundation is currently provided. Nor should it

prevent community colleges from assigning morewriting in those cases in which it now assigns none,

or from asking students to read material which is

vital to their mastery of the initial skills their futureemployers will require.

Te issues revealed by this study are clearly not

limited to the low standards for mathematics and

English literacy in our high schools. Tere is astriking mismatch between the kind of literacyskills demanded for success in college and careers

and the curriculum in our schools. Some of thismismatch is addressed by the new Common Core

State Standards. As such, the standards represent apromising rst step in righting this ship, but their

faithful implementation will likely be a heavy liftfor our schools, and even if successfully executed,oer no guarantee of fully addressing the many

shortcomings identied by this study. Parallelinitiatives on the community college front are

also in order as is a commitment to build on thisinitial research to deepen our understanding of the

issues at hand and to track the results of the mostpromising eorts that may be mounted to address

the shortcomings identied here.

Tis report will be jarring for many. Our ndingspaint a very dierent picture of the actual standards

for success in our community colleges than manyhave been carrying around in their heads. While

we are condent that our research techniques

have enabled us to produce a much more accuratepicture of those standards than the nation hasever had before, we do not regard this report asthe last word on the subject. We would welcome

studies that include a much larger random sampleof colleges, take a closer look at colleges with

outstanding reputations and gather a larger sampleof the materials used in courses as well as student

work. We think it would be worthwhile to do casestudies of community colleges, looking in more

detail at classroom practices and interviewing

instructors to better understand why they arenot making full use of the texts they assign andgauge their own sense of their students needs and

limitations. It is not unusual for researchers, intheir reports, to call for more research, but we dobelieve that, in this case, more research could pay

large dividends.



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Philip Daro, Co-Chair

Director, Strategic Education Research

Partnership San FranciscoSenior Fellow, Mathematics

Pearson - Americas ChoiceBerkeley, CA

Solomon Garfunkel, Co-Chair

Executive DirectorConsortium for Mathematics and Its Applications

Bedford, MA

John T. Baldwin

Professor Emeritus, Department of Mathematics

and StatisticsUniversity of Illinois at ChicagoChicago, IL

Patrick Callahan

Co-Director of Special Projects, CaliforniaMathematics Project

University of California, Los AngelesLos Angeles, CA

Andrew S. Chen

PresidentEduron Corporation

Winchester, MA

Wade Ellis, Jr.

Instructor of Mathematics (ret.)

West Valley CollegeSaratoga, CA

Robert L. Kimball, Jr.

Head, Mathematics and Physics Department (ret.)Wake echnical Community CollegeRaleigh, NC

Lucy Hernandez Michal

Professor, Department of MathematicsEl Paso Community College

El Paso, X

Geri Anderson-Nielsen

Independent Consultant

Washington, DC

Lisa SeidmanProfessor, Department of Biotechnology

Madison Area echnical CollegeMadison, WI

Colin L. Starr

Chair, Department of MathematicsWillamette University

Salem, OR

mAThEmATiC s pAnEL



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Richard P. Durn, Co-Chair

Professor, Gervitz Graduate School of Education

University of California, Santa BarbaraSanta Barbara, CA

Sally Hampton, Co-Chair

Senior FellowPearson Americas Choice

Fort Worth, TX

Catherine E. Snow, Co-Chair

Patricia Albjerg Graham Professor of Education

Graduate School of EducationHarvard University

Cambridge, MA

Paul Carney

English Instructor

Minnesota State Community and Technical College

Fergus Falls, MN

Mark W. Conley

Professor of Literacy

University of MemphisMemphis, TN

David D. Haynes

Associate Professor of English and Director,Creative Writing

Southern Methodist University

Dallas, TX

George Hillocks, Jr.

Emeritus Professor of EnglishUniversity of Chicago

Chicago, IL

Tanya M. Hodge

English Teacher and English Department Chair

South High SchoolMinneapolis, MN

John McMillan

PresidentInquiry By DesignFort Worth, TX

Danielle S. McNamara

Professor of Psychology and Senior Scientist,Learning Sciences Institute

Arizona State UniversityTempe, AZ

Sandra Murphy

Professor Emerita, School of EducationUniversity of California, Davis

Walnut Creek, CA

Maricel G. Santos

Associate Professor of English

San Francisco State UniversitySan Francisco, CA

Howard B. Tinberg

Professor of EnglishBristol Community CollegeFall River, MA

ENGLISH PANEL

12 W h a t D o e s I t R e a l l y M e a n t o B e C o l l e g e a n D W o R k R e a D y ?


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Howard T. Everson, Co-Chair

Executive Director and ProfessorCenter for Advanced Study in Education Graduate

School & University CenterCity University of New York

New York, NY

James W. Pellegrino, Co-Chair

Liberal Arts and Sciences

Distinguished ProfessorDistinguished Professor of Education

Co-Director, Learning Sciences Research InstituteUniversity of Illinois at Chicago

Chicago, IL

Lloyd Bond

Consulting ScholarCarnegie Foundation for the Advancement

of TeachingVacaville, CA

Philip Daro

Director, Strategic Education ResearchPartnership San Francisco

Senior Fellow, MathematicsPearson Americas Choice

Berkeley, CA

Richard P. Durn

Professor

Gevitz Graduate School of EducationUniversity of California, Santa Barbara

Santa Barbara, CA

Edward H. Haertel

Jacks Family Professor of Education, Emeritus

Graduate School of EducationStanford University

Stanford, CA

Joan Herman

Director

National Center for Research on Evaluation,Standards and Student Testing

University of California, Los AngelesLos Angeles, CA

Robert L. Linn

Distinguished Professor Emeritus of EducationUniversity of Colorado

Ouray, CO

Catherine E. Snow

Patricia Albjerg Graham Professor

Graduate School of EducationHarvard UniversityCambridge, MA

Dylan Wiliam

Emeritus Professor of Educational AssessmentInstitute of Education

University of LondonLondon, England

TECHNICALADV ISORY COMMITTEE



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Once again, NCEE has done a great service by documenting the facts and providing solutions

to a major problem in American education, which everyone, including educational leaders, is

sleeping through. In Massachusetts alone, students taking remedial courses at the community

college level largely fail and it is at an annual cost of tens of millions of dollars and involves

tens of thousands of students. NCEE points out that it is time for the education system

starting at the middle school level to align content, raise it over time and at long last

properly prepare students for the world of college and the workplace.

Dav i D P . Dr i scol l

Chair, National Assessment Governing Board

Former Massachusetts Commissioner of Education

2000 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Suite 5300

Washington, DC 20006

This is truly impressive work about what really matters. I was struck by its intelligence and clarity.

Common Core implementation is a huge next step in ensuring that our nations students are

college- and career-ready. This analysis by NCEE of community college curriculum as compared

to what students are learning at the K-12 level points to some troubling gaps in our education

pipeline that, if not addressed, will imperil our ability to prepare the next generation.

Dav i D col eman

President and CEO

The College Board

With all the attention being devoted to Americas educational system underperformance in

K-12, obsolescent nancial models in our state universities we have overlooked one of the

systems most important elements: our community colleges. These institutions enroll nearly half

of our college students, teach much needed skills in the trades, and prepare students for four-

year degrees. The ndings described in this report will surprise some readers but deserve

careful consideration by all who care about Americas ability to preserve or improve Americasstandard of living.

n orman au gu st i n e

Retired Chairman and CEO

Lockheed Martin Corporation

college readiness and high school study

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