Immersive scheduling engages students in one or two subjects at a time over short teaching periods. While there is incipient evidence that immersive delivery can heighten academic outcomes in undergraduate education, much less is known about its effectiveness in pathways or access programs. This exploratory mixed-methods study investigated how a…

Far too many California students are falling off the pathway to and through college. At current rates of high school and college completion, only about 30 percent of California 9th graders will earn a bachelor's degree, a rate that is insufficient for an economy that increasingly demands more highly educated workers. In this study, the authors…

Many students graduate from high school academically unprepared for college. When such students enroll in college as first-time freshmen, they are commonly placed in non-credit-bearing developmental English and math courses to develop the skills necessary to complete freshman-level credit-bearing courses. Understanding students' college readiness…

An increasing number of students enter college underprepared. These students do not have the academic skills to take college-level courses and are placed in remedial classes. Career counseling can help underprepared college students make educated career decisions based on their current situations. This article explores the characteristics of…

In its current form, developmental education may be one of the largest impediments to success in California's community colleges. Each year, hundreds of thousands of students are deemed underprepared for college and placed into developmental (also known as remedial or basic-skills) courses. Yet most never earn a degree or certificate, or transfer…

This document presents the technical appendix that accompanies the full report, "Preparing Students for Success in California's Community Colleges." The appendix includes Data and Methods. [Supported with funding from the Sutton Family Fund. For the full report, see ED570976.]

For colleges to develop effective dropout prevention strategies, it is necessary to have a clear picture of who these early dropouts are. This report identifies distinguishing characteristics of this group by analyzing six years of transcript data on 14,429 first-time college students who in 2005 and 2006 enrolled at one of five community colleges…

The purpose of higher education is to prepare students for the workforce. In order to prepare students for the workforce, many life lessons must be learned specifically respect for others' work. One of the invaluable lessons that a student can learn regarding respect for others' work is to appreciate originality and avoid of plagiarism. To be…

Despite the need, persistence in remediation hovers at 50% (NCES, 2002) while nearly one third of community college enrollees arrive under-prepared (Hess, 2009). Persistence is correlated with academic preparation (Nash & Kallenbach, 2009), and barriers to persistence include a number of demographic barriers (Education, 2006; Labaree, 2006).…

State legislation launched the California Partnership Academies (CPAs) in 1984. CPAs exemplify the career academy model for preparing high school students to succeed in both college and careers. Career academies are small learning communities within larger high schools, usually enrolling students in grades 10-12. Each year students take classes…

Each year millions of young people graduate from high school and enroll in colleges and universities across the country, and many of these students are underprepared for the demands and academic rigor of college-level courses. The purpose of this study was to determine whether there were significant differences in graduation rates between students…

An important goal for California is that public high schools continue to make progress in closing the achievement gap between demographic groups and that students are prepared for postsecondary education. In early 2008 Commission staff started developing a composite measure of academic preparation based on standardized test scores in nine college…

This paper presents results of a qualitative study describing classroom participation in pre-college mathematics classes taught by seven successful community college faculty members. The analysis reveals high levels of student participation coupled with low complexity, which can result in detrimental opportunities for students to learn…

Although much national effort has been made to align the K-12 and higher education systems, the educational pipeline is still leaky at every stage. Furthermore, one of the on-going issues in the educational system is the lack of readiness of high school graduates for post-secondary education, especially for low income and minority students. As a…

North Queens Community High School serves approximately 200 students, 16-20 years old, as they strive to reach their personal and academic goals. All students at North Queens have previously been enrolled in high school elsewhere and are over-age and undercredited. Small class sizes, student-centered support, and an accelerated credit acquisition…