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 comparing program outcomes to accepted benchmarks; and (2) to compare features and practices of the programs to professional standards in order to facilitate improved service to students. The particular purpose of Phase 1 is to compare HCCS's program with other state two-year institutions using specific remedial success indicators, in order to provide the context for a more detailed examination of HCCS's own developmental studies programs. The first measure utilized by this study is success on the TASP test. The second measure utilized is analysis of the 1994-95 incoming student cohort to determine how many completed remediation and related college-level work. The third indicator utilized was the performance of remediated students as compared with their unremediated peers. The fourth indicator used was the rate of student success as analyzed by student ethnicity. The conclusions state that HCCS serves a particularly underprepared population of students who, after remediation, succeed at a comparable or higher rate than similar students at other colleges. (Contains 15 references.) (VWC)