This dissertation examined how adult learners who took developmental mathematics in a community college and passed the courses, viewed their self-efficacy and the roles they felt self-efficacy had on their successful completion of mathematics. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 10 adult learners in two U.S. community colleges.…

Community colleges began as a way to offer higher education to those that wanted it but could not leave home to further their degree. As they evolved, they began allowing students to be admitted with very little admission requirements. The lack of admission requirements led to students being admitted into community colleges that were not prepared…

Online education has increased access to higher education for many populations of students. One group of students that has grown in this area are nontraditional students. A sub-population of this group that is absent from the research are nontraditional students of color. Using the conceptual frameworks of Adult Learning Theory and…

This article considers recent trends in developmental education and analyzes disaggregated student data, exploring the extent to which developmental education reform of corequisite instruction affected access of one community college's students to a first-semester composition course. By examining student access and student success across two…

The Post-Traditional Remedial Learner in higher education is a student constituency that has historically been "Hidden in Plain Sight" and strikingly absent from substantive discussions that foreground their lived experiences, relevance, and success in post-secondary education. Though physically present on campus and numerically…

Developmental English (DE) has been under fire from critics who think it acts as a barrier rather than as a support to the success of students placing into DE. In Texas, such pressures led to a wave of reforms and changes affecting delivery and structure of DE instruction. This dissertation draws on years of internal data at one community college…

The growing number of underprepared students entering two- and four-year colleges and universities is the number one challenge currently facing the field of higher education. According to the American Association of Community Colleges, 41% of all undergraduates and 39% of first-time freshman consider community college their "go-to"…

Developmental education has existed as a thread of American higher education since the founding of Harvard College in 1636, when tutors provided supplemental Latin programming for underprepared students. In recent years, developmental education is most prominent at community colleges: ninety-eight percent of the colleges offer some form of…

Developmental mathematics is often a barrier to student progress and success in college. As a result and for this reason, this research study describes the redesign of a developmental mathematics course at a U.S. East Coast university to decrease the amount of time it takes for students to complete their developmental requirement and increase the…

The purpose of this quantitative, non-experimental, cross-sectional, ex-post facto data study was to examine factors related to community college students who enrolled in developmental English and/or enrolled in combined developmental English and reading courses persistence and engagement at urban community colleges. The dependent variables…

Developmental education reform has shown promising evidence toward improving short-term outcomes, yet questions remain about whether these early gains contribute momentum toward mid-term and longer-term postsecondary success. In 2014, Florida implemented one of the nation's most comprehensive developmental education reforms. Many students became…

The purpose of this qualitative descriptive study was to describe how first-year college students describe the academic benefits and effectiveness of participating in a developmental education program in preparing them for academic success. The theoretical frameworks supporting this study were Bandura's theory of self-efficacy and Tinto's theory…

This resource provides data on reporting requirements determined by state statute. Only statutorily created requirements are included. In this resource, the following categories are used: (1) student populations (e.g., recent high school graduates, total number or percentage of students enrolled in developmental courses); (2) student…

This study examined transition services provided to students with disabilities in their secondary environments and whether or not these services prepared students with disabilities to post-secondary transition. Fifty students with varying disabilities from seven southeastern high schools participated in this study. Quantitative and qualitative…

Learning Expectations and Academic Preparation (LEAP) was a two-year pilot offering a cohort (20 students) of our lowest scoring English and mathematics developmental students an intensive cross-disciplinary semester to accelerate through their developmental courses. Blending learning community and summer bridge best practices, LEAP incorporated…