Bastedo, M. N., & Gumport, P. J. (2003). Access to what? Mission differentiation and academic stratification in U.S. public higher education. Higher Education: The International Journal of Higher Education and Educational Planning, 46(3), 341-359. This article analyzes developmental education policy in Massachusetts and New York to examine recent policy decisions regarding the termination of academic programs, elimination of remedial education, promotion of honors colleges within each state system. A result of these policy decisions has been to increase stratification of programs and students within a public state higher education system as well as with individual institutions within the state system. The authors argue that more intense analysis needs to be conducted before systematic changes are made within education systems to avoid or at least forecast major changes in the stratification of student opportunity to attend postsecondary education.
Contextualizing the historic role of learning assistance, those who work in learning assistance programs neither determine admission criteria nor set academic standards (Boylan, 1995a). Admissions officers, administrators, faculty committees, and state higher education executive offices are responsible for those decisions. Once standards are set, however, it is the job of learning assistance faculty and staff to ensure students meet or exceed them. The need for learning assistance was created as soon as the first college opened its doors to those prepared to pass the admissions examination and those who were not. These criteria de facto divided students into two groups: those admitted normally and those admitted provisionally. Provisional students need additional academic assistance and enrichment. As the upcoming history chapter documents, many students attending U.S. colleges in the 1700s and 1800s participated in learning assistance activities before admission as well as throughout their academic career (Boylan and White, 1987; Brier, 1984).
Nearly all institutions historically offered developmental courses. During the past twenty years, eight states have or are in process of eliminating developmental courses at public four-year colleges. At the same time, thirty states rejected similar legislation (Abraham and Creech, 2000). These mixed results indicate that some states are mandating the shift of the courses from public four-year institutions to community colleges (Hankin, 1996). Shifting the developmental courses often occurs at the level of the campus or state system. For example, in Missouri no state legislation required shifting these courses. Three decades ago, the University of Missouri system eliminated the courses. State four-year and two-year institutions informally assumed them.
During the past quarter century, community colleges assumed primary responsibility for vocational programs, workplace literacy, displaced worker retraining, certificate programs, and others. Their primary role of preparing students for transfer to senior institutions expanded. Traditional boundaries between community and technical colleges blurred as costly technical programs were offered at community colleges. These expanded curricular responsibilities required community colleges to invest in more buildings, equipment, and faculty members for expensive high-demand certificate and associate degree programs in response to local needs of citizens and employers. Increased prestige of community colleges and heightened stigma concerning developmental courses led a growing number of community college leaders to reject increased responsibility for them (McGrath and Spear, 1994; Oudenhoven, 2002). Community colleges are placed in a double bind to maintain their traditional open admission access and increase academic standards necessary for the new curricular offerings. Some leaders question how both can be maintained while dealing with a large influx of students needing developmental courses formerly offered at four-year colleges (Perin, 2006).
Some policymakers direct students with academic preparation requiring developmental courses to begin their college career at junior and community colleges. These students might be accepted for transfer to the senior institution if their junior college academic profile warrants. The transfer process from community colleges to senior institutions has numerous challenges. As a result, the students are placed at higher risk for academic failure than those who begin their careers in four-year schools (Pascarella and Terenzini, 1991).
Considerable effort has been made with articulation agreements among two-year and four-year institutions. The transfer process is not transparent, however, and the rate of completing an undergraduate degree is lower for students who begin at a two-year institution than for those beginning at a four-year institution, even when controlling for other variables (Pascarella and Terenzini, 1991). Barriers to success for transfer students include not accepting or requiring them to repeat courses previously completed and the turbulence experienced by students as they move from one academic environment to another. It is common for students to experience academic difficulty and earn lower grade averages as a result at the senior institution (Eggleston and Laanan, 2001).
With institutional resources, including learning assistance, students from a wide range of ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds can be accepted and supported for academic success. Learning assistance, especially developmental courses, have been significant resources for students of color (Boylan, Bonham, and Bliss, 1994). These services along with other institutional supports increase the likelihood of higher student achievement and persistence toward graduation.
- Abraham, A. A., and Creech, J. D. (2000). Reducing remedial education: What progress are states making? Educational Benchmark 2000 Series. Atlanta: Southern Regional Education Board. Retrieved August 19, 2004, from http://www.sreb.org.
- Boylan, H. R. (1995a). Making the case for developmental education. Research in Developmental Education, 12(2), 1–4.
- Boylan, H. R., and White, W. G., Jr. (1987). Educating all the nation’s people: The historical roots of developmental education. Part I. Review of Research in Developmental Education, 4(4), 1–4.
- Brier, E. (1984). Bridging the academic preparation gap: An historical view. Journal of Developmental Education, 8(1), 2–5.
- Eggleston, L. E., and Laanan, F. S. (2001). Making the transition to the senior institution. In F. S. Laanan (Ed.), Transfer students: Trends and issues. New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 114, pp. 87–97. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- McGrath, D., and Spear, M. B. (1994). The remediation of the community college. In J. L. Ratcliff, S. Schwarz, and L. H. Ebbers (Eds.). Community colleges (pp. 217–228). Need-ham Heights, MA: Simon & Schuster.
- Oudenhoven, B. (2002). Remediation at the community college: Pressing issues, uncertain solutions. In T. H. Bers and H. D. Calhoun (Eds.), New steps for the community college. New Directions for Community Colleges, no. 117. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Pascarella, E. T., and Terenzini, P. T. (1991). How college affects students. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
- Perin, D. (2006). Can community colleges protect both access and standards? The problem of remediation. Teachers College Record, 108(3), 339–373.
As a historian, I have been interested in the history of learning assistance and developmental education. Listening to the rhetoric of today as some argue for the elimination of developmental-level courses, a listener might think that such courses are a recent creation. A careful review of the historical record reveals they have been embedded as part of American higher education since the start. Below is the first of three parts of an examination of the 1800s. These are excerpts from my 2010 book published by Jossey-Bass, "Access at the crossroads: Learning assistance in higher education."
After the U.S. Civil War, students who were considered academically under-prepared were aggressively recruited. Economic and social changes throughout the United States fueled by the Civil War significantly influenced expansion of learning assistance at more colleges. Many male students did not seek admission or left college to join their respective armies. Many colleges in the North and South replaced them and their tuition payments through expanded academic preparatory departments that supported underage students who were too young to enlist. Examples from the North include Valparaiso University in Indiana, which replaced college students through a rapid expansion of the academic preparatory department. Although the liberal arts college and theology school at Bucknell University closed temporarily in 1865, the academic preparatory school at the same college significantly increased its enrollment. Offsetting enrollment decreases saved many institutions from closing. Southern colleges followed the same pattern of Northern institutions through extended academic preparatory departments and acceptance of applicants formerly denied admission. In 1861 the University of Alabama created an academic preparatory department for boys twelve years and older. In 1863 the University of Georgia created University High School and suspended rules prohibiting admission of boys younger than fourteen to the university. The Faculty Senate of South Carolina College in 1862 voted to admit young students to replace revenue lost by former students who had left the institution to join the Confederate Army (Rudy, 1996).
