Texas Higher Education Commissoner Raymund Paredes has testified repeatedly in legislative hearings that developmental education needs a “complete overhaul” because it “isn’t working.” He and the Coordinating Board have endorsed a proposal to place new appropriations into a fund, with the Board serving as trustee. This revenue is to be granted to schools competitively through pilot non-course based programs, using evidence gathered from studies and best practices around the country. In the meantime, developmental courses would be funded in the traditional manner while information is gathered and pilot programs are launched and evaluated.
TCCTA is assembling a number of "Talking Points" for communicating with policy makers, leading up to the next Regular Session in January. The following points are offered for use by teachers in discussing the developmental education issue with policy makers. The TCCTA Legislative and Executive Committees will formulate and publish the association’s official Legislative Program this fall for the 2009 Regular Session.
IMPORTANT: Do not use college equipment, e-mail addresses, or stationery when communicating with state policy makers. Also, it is important to always be constructive when communicating with public officials. Be sure to thank them for their hard work on behalf of the people of Texas.
TCCTA "Talking Points" on Developmental Education
Statistics gathered by the Coordinating Board are often confusing and difficult to interpret. Since TASP was replaced by TSI, each school has designed its own approach, making generalizations problematic if not impossible.
Under the current Texas regimen, a student who enrolls in a developmental course, passes a placement test subsequently, then drops the class before the end of the term, is counted as a failure. Such measurement problems must be resolved before judging the effectiveness of developmental education.
Since the funding formula does not require that revenue generated by developmental education courses be spent on these courses, great variety exists statewide. Developmental education courses that receive adequate funding to hire talented faculty, and to provide necessary resources and training, are more successful.
Legislators are urged to read published national studies on this subject carefully. Often a headline or caption can be very misleading. Furthermore, the most recent evidence may be missing.
A perennial problem in collecting reliable and valid developmental education data is finding equivalent control groups to compare the effectiveness of remediation on student outcomes against similarly prepared students who did not receive remediation. Only recently have studies begun using more sophisticated methods. One such study (Attewell, et al., 2006) found that similarly prepared students who received developmental education were more likely to succeed (as measured by retention and achievement) than those who did not receive developmental education.
In the absence of valid statistical data, legislators are urged to listen to impressive and countless anecdotes from community college students whose academic careers were saved dramatically by effective developmental education.
For further elaboration and documentation provided by Gail Platt, Director of the Teaching and Learning Center and Department of Education, Title V Project Director, South Plains College, please see below.
From Dr. Platt:
The accountability data collected and reported by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) and the Legislative Budget Board (LBB) are misleading and difficult to interpret. Each program at each institution is best able to describe the programs and report results and student learning outcomes. When practitioners collect and explain their own data to the legislators a lucid and credible story emerges.
Since TASP was replaced with TSI, each institution has its own policies regarding developmental education; therefore, statewide comparisons are impossible.
Some of the THECB accountability data on developmental education found at the THECB website may be useful, but always check the data against your own records. Mistakes in data reporting occur often.
Here’s an example of how data can be misleading: CBM 002 data looks at course completion; if a student does not complete the course, the student is a failure. However, let’s say a student enrolls in a developmental reading course and after one month of instruction and practice feels confident that s/he can pass the TSI placement test. The student tests and meets the standard: Success. However, if the student then decides to drop the reading class and is given an X or W, the data will reflect that student as a failure.
Although data are the best way to demonstrate accountability, also be prepared to share with your legislators specific examples of students (their constituents) who have benefited from developmental education. These anecdotes often help legislators when they speak about their views and values of developmental education and how it impacts the people in their community.
The legislature and the public are always concerned about the so-called “costs” of developmental education. Funding for developmental education always raises questions, but as practitioners we need to be diligent in pointing out that in the past, developmental education funding resulted from the reporting of formula funded contact course hours in developmental coursework. [See http://www.lbb.state.tx.us/Higher_Education/Cost_Developmental_Ed_TX_0407.pdf.]
There is no safeguard or assurance that funds generated by the reporting of contact hours in courses are expended for those courses. If an institution invests in quality professors for developmental education courses, obtains good materials and equipment to promote learning, provides adequate professional development for developmental practitioners, sets good policies for placement and monitoring students in developmental education and observes smaller class sizes for developmental education (and other best practices), the institution will be expending funds on developmental education and will have a strong program. Studies have shown that this is seldom the case. With the introduction of TSI and each institution having its own policies, there is even greater variability among the programs in Texas than in the past. Boylan (1996) said there were wide differences among programs and – at that time of his study – the only evidence of funds expended on TASP were the test fees paid by the students.
National studies are often flawed and have failed to produce reliable data. A problem in the past in collecting reliable and valid developmental education data was finding equivalent control groups to compare the effectiveness of remediation on student outcomes against similarly prepared students who did not receive remediation. Only recently have studies begun using more sophisticated research methods to produce more reliable and valid findings. One such study (Attewell, et al, 2006) found that similarly prepared students who received developmental education were more likely to succeed (retention and achievement) than those who did not receive developmental education.
Two reports circulating around the Texas legislature have prompted some individuals to claim that developmental education in Texas does not work (See http://chronicle.com/temp/email2.php?id=djXwB2RzjwzrhxvtRtjZQgfnZ6gzpzHr).
If one carefully reads the studies, one finds that Martorell and McFarlin (2007) cautioned that their data be interpreted carefully, keeping in mind that a very select group of students performing at a very slim margin on the TASP Math Test (a test that fewer and fewer students are taking as the placement test in our institutions) comprised the sample. Based on this caveat, they suggested that developmental math courses caused more harm than good. The researcher for the second study commissioned by College Ready Texas (Miller, 2007) used the Martorell and McFarlin data. When you hear that a report has claimed developmental education does not work, be sure to get a copy of the report and find out what it really says. Legislators do not have time to always read the vast amount of information they are given. A sentence may catch their eye (or their staff’s eyes) and thus – we have a big problem although the full and complete data have not been gathered or analyzed to support that conclusion.
See also:
Attewell, Paul A., Lavin, David E., Domina, Thurston & Levey, Tania (2006).
New Evidence on College Remediation, The Journal of Higher Education - Volume 77, Number 5, September/October 2006, pp. 886-924.
Boylan, H. R. (1996). Evaluation of the Texas Academic Skills Program. National Center for Developmental Education. Boone, NC: NCDE..
SUMMARY OF “COLLEGE READINESS AND DEVELOPMENTAL EDUCATION IN TEXAS: 1998-2005”COMMISSION FOR A COLLEGE READY TEXAS (http://www.tea.state.tx.us/ed_init/thscsic/CollegeReadinessDevelopmentalEducationSummary.pdf)
College Ready Texas and developmental education study (http://www.collegereadytexas.org/documents/College%20Readiness%20and%20Developmental%20Education120707.pdf).