Sixteen premedical students from underrepresented minority groups participated in a six-week, six-course program at the Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine (Illinois). Academic performance before and during program participation was compared for students subsequently offered or denied admission. Accepted and denied students could be…

Reviews the literature related to student attrition and retention. Discusses findings from a survey of community college students who withdrew from developmental courses, to determine their reasons for leaving. Describes intervention programs that were subsequently developed, including telephone intervention, mentoring, and skills enhancement…

The Purdue University (Indiana) Department of Freshman Engineering offers a counselor-tutorial program to high-potential, but academically disadvantaged, freshmen. The program's counseling and tutorial services are intended to help students successfully complete their first-year courses in calculus, chemistry, and physics. Experience shows…

Two studies on monitoring and assisting high-risk college students are compared. Individualized intervention was provided in the first study, whereas the second attempted a reduced form of the same intervention in a large-group course. Both emphasized student awareness of appropriate study behavior. Only the first study had positive results.…

Research suggests several types of test-anxious students. Techniques for lessening anxiety include teaching metacognitive and learning strategies, using cooperative learning activities, and creating a nonthreatening environment. A survey of 102 developmental reading college students indicated that teacher behavior during testing and pretest review…

The American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) was established to develop technically informed leadership within the Indian community by significantly and quickly increasing the number of American Indian scientists and engineers, ensuring professional growth, and developing Indian leaders through precollege culturally sensitive camps,…

Discusses the importance of instruction in metacognition, the mental process of observing, evaluating, and making adjustments in one's own thinking behavior to enhance comprehension during a learning activity. Reviews educational programs which have taught metacognitive behaviors and charts a model instructional approach for use in the college…

Supports the use of the applied linguistics technique of error analysis (i.e., charting and analyzing patterns in language errors) in developmental writing instruction. Argues that error enables teachers to diagnose the cognitive strategies and processes used by students in writing. Discusses teaching strategies and the approach's limitations.…

Uses the examples of remedial education, K-16 initiatives, and workforce preparation to illustrate how these values influence higher education policy at community colleges. Policymakers should recognize that these values may conflict, therefore leading to controversy. States that cultural/social values dominating the development of educational…

Suggests that there are three ways of taking in information: internalizing inert information, forming activated ignorance, or achieving activated knowledge. Explains that only activated knowledge leads the learner, by implication, to more knowledge, and that seeking the logic of things can lead to discovery of activated knowledge. (NB)

Presents the responses of six of the leaders in developmental education to questions about the future of the field. Their responses point to three main trends: mainstreaming the developmental courses into college-level, graduation-credit programs; removal of developmental education from four-year institutions; and increased professionalism of…

For a country such as Japan where higher education is historically and widely esteemed, the visually-impaired community's incongruous departure from the university route to a vocational one is considered in relation to post-school choices. The predominance of the "riryoka" vocation for the visually-impaired (VI) largely influences…

Research has found evidence for the validity of remedial and developmental English courses in preparing students to pass freshman-level English courses. To determine whether similar validity could be demonstrated for remedial and developmental English courses at Tennessee's Walters State Community College, the percentage of former remedial and…

This booklet provides some guidelines for preparing African American students for college. Parents' experiences with higher education are a key to shaping their expectations for their children, and the lack of direct parental experience can be a handicap for students who will be the first generation of their families to attend college. Educators…

This report addresses the issue of developmental education. Among the data presented is the number of high school graduates who were placed in developmental courses in English, reading, and mathematics. Included are abstracts of information submitted upon request by the following community colleges: Cochise, Cococino, Eastern Arizona, Maricopa,…