How should colleges determine whether students are placed into developmental or college-level courses? Each year, colleges place millions of students into developmental math and English courses upon enrollment. To do so, colleges most often use a high-stakes placement test, which numerous research studies have shown to be highly inaccurate in…

Various aspects of the goals and processes of the evaluation of remedial programs are discussed in this paper. The first section discussses assumptions related to remedial program evaluation in California's community colleges and highlights two perspectives, based on whether the remedial programs satisfy internal and/or external criteria. Next, a…

This article is designed to present an overview of critical theory, research, and evaluation for the developmental mathematics educator. Students caught in the gap between high school mathematics preparation and entry-level college mathematics expectations--developmental mathematics education students--need to have their personal narratives told…

Many developmental educators have been assigned increased responsibilities for campus-wide enrollment management activities. A new system is needed for educators to more accurately sort through the rapidly growing database of information related to student retention. This will enable the reader to more quickly identify promising practices for…

Following a discussion of various methods of evaluating the effectiveness of developmental programs, this paper presents a research design for the evaluation of a developmental math program. First, the paper examines the objectives and benefits of conducting formative and summative program evaluations. The paper then identifies the single group…

Results from the second phase of a project to investigate strategies and outcomes associated with the assessment and evaluation of developmental/remedial/basic skills programs in New York State are presented in this report. Part I introduces the Assessment of Effectiveness of Developmental Programs in Postsecondary Education project, and the major…

Three types of evaluation methods are discussed in terms of their use in evaluating both cognitive and affective learning in developmental programs: standardized tests; criterion-referenced tests; and naturalistic inquiries. Section I looks at the complexities of learning and the inherent difficulties in judging the quality and quantity of what is…

This paper addresses the methodological issues encountered when attempting to evaluate a college course's effectiveness by determining whether students who enroll in it perform at higher levels than students who did not enroll. The paper identifies resource people who may be helpful in the evaluation, and offers guidelines for the research…

In the prevailing atmosphere of concern for basic skills development, Houston Community College System (HCCS) faculty and administration perceived the need for a self-evaluation of HCCS's developmental studies programs. The purposes of the resulting study are: (1) to evaluate the effectiveness of the institution's developmental studies programs by…

When the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges compiled best practices for serving basic skills students in 2002-2003, assessment practices were notably absent. In this paper, problems with current assessment and placement practices with regards to basic skills are explored. The paper begins with a review of the matriculation process…