The proceedings of a conference for administrators, faculty, and staff of developmental education programs are summarized. An introductory section outlines the history, development, and definition of developmental education in the United States and gives statistics on the number and percentage of various institution types reporting developmental program activities, with breakdowns for reading, English, mathematics, and special admissions programs in two- and four-year colleges. The objective of the conference is described as helping programs improve learning environments without sacrificing quality of instruction. The keynote speech by Willa B. Player is outlined and the three rotating conference sessions are described. The sessions focused on course development (student characteristics, instructional objectives, content selection, the learning process, and instructional analysis); instructional and learning styles; and analytical reasoning. Results of a conference evaluation survey are given. Major conference recommendations include development of: instructional practices to accommodate special needs; recruitment and admission strategies to match students' educational needs; student personnel services; faculty and staff development programs; formative and summative evaluation strategies for nontraditional and developmental programs; reallocation of resources at state and institutional levels; and nontraditional procedures for collecting and analyzing retention data. (MSE)