Publications

Informed by a recent project to scale MMA throughout the state of Arkansas, this CAPR brief describes the state’s policy context, summarizes adoption efforts, and presents five strategies for other states that want to scale assessment reform.

This CAPR report draws on interview data with faculty and staff to examine how seven City University of New York colleges transitioned to fully scaled corequisite courses in English and math and the implications of their choices for early implementation.

This paper describes research that prompted developmental education reform, explores efforts in California that led to the passing of A.B. 705, summarizes research on its implementation and outcomes, and discusses the implications of this research for improving postsecondary access and success.

This CAPR report highlights the roles of key actors and of state context and policy in the implementation of multiple measures assessment (MMA) at 12 two- and four-year colleges in Arkansas and Texas. It also discusses costs and describes challenges, such as obtaining staff buy-in, managing student data, and ensuring sufficient staffing.

Using interview data from program leaders and statewide student data, this paper examines the implementation and estimates the effects of Ohio’s Innovative Programs, a policy aimed at expanding access to dual enrollment for underserved high school students.

Using nine terms of outcomes data, this CAPR working paper presents findings from an impact study on multiple measures assessment at seven State University of New York (SUNY) community colleges.

This CAPR brief describes findings and implications of an evaluation study of multiple measures assessment (MMA); it focuses on results among students whose placements changed (or would have changed) under MMA.

Based on interview, focus group, observational, and student survey data, this CAPR brief presents findings on the design and implementation of corequisite developmental courses at four colleges, and it highlights lessons for other colleges.

In a review of impact and implementation studies from the past ten years, this CAPR report summarizes what is known about how innovations to developmental education can improve student outcomes, and it draws out five principles that are key for reform.

This CAPR brief provides a taxonomy of various informed self-placement (ISP) systems, shares descriptive data from three colleges using ISP, and identifies important equity and access considerations for implementation.

Using administrative data, this report examines early college outcomes of students placed into corequisite reading courses at the 13 community colleges in the Tennessee Board of Regents system.

This paper provides the first causal evidence on a system-wide corequisite reform, using data from all 13 community colleges affiliated with the Tennessee Board of Regents.

This article describes how lesson study—a structured, collaborative professional development intervention—encouraged developmental mathematics faculty at three community colleges to implement new approaches to instruction.

This CAPR brief describes two recent experimental studies of multiple measures assessment, in which colleges use measures beyond placement test scores to determine students’ college readiness.

This report describes findings from a random assignment study examining the implementation, cost, and efficacy of multiple measures assessments for placing students into college-level or developmental courses.

This report describes a project undertaken by CCRC, Education Northwest, and three Oregon community colleges to adapt lesson study for use among faculty teaching a precollege (developmental) quantitative literacy course.

This fact sheet describes how traditional developmental education may have unintended consequences for students and the growing body of research evidence on promising reforms.

This brief discusses how community college systems in four states—Indiana, Virginia, Texas, and Washington—supported large-scale changes to student placement practices in reaction to challenges associated with the COVID pandemic.

This paper examines the equity implications of existing reforms to developmental math and explores the potential of more targeted reforms to address factors such as stereotype threat, math anxiety, instructor bias, and tracking.

This report describes impact findings from an evaluation of multiple measures assessment and placement at seven State University of New York (SUNY) community colleges.

This paper describes the professional development model used in CUNY Start, a program developed at the City University of New York to support entering students identified as academically underprepared in literacy and mathematics.

This report examines the efforts of six state higher education systems to improve student outcomes and close opportunity gaps in mathematics as part of a three-year project led by the Charles A. Dana Center at The University of Texas at Austin.

This study uses a randomized controlled trial to evaluate the efficacy of multiple measures assessment programs at five colleges in Minnesota and Wisconsin and also examines the implementation and cost of the programs.

This CAPR report examines how four Texas community colleges implemented Dana Center Mathematics Pathways (DCMP) and the impact of DCMP on student outcomes over as many as four semesters. Costs of the initiative and student perspectives are also discussed.

This CAPR report documents developmental education practices used in broad-access two- and four-year colleges across the country based on a 2016 survey of public two- and four-year colleges and private, nonprofit four-year colleges as well as interviews with institutional and state leaders.

This handbook presents a wide range of research on adults who have low literacy skills. It looks at the cognitive, affective, and motivational factors underlying adult literacy; adult literacy in different countries; and the educational approaches being taken to help improve adults’ literacy skills.

This research brief describes findings from a survey about mathematics course offerings at institutions in six states implementing mathematics pathways.

This short report provides a rationale for implementing Lesson Study, a collaborative and structured professional development approach, in the community college context.

This study examines if students participating in Dana Center Mathematics Pathways (DCMP) developmental courses enroll in and pass college-level math courses at higher rates than students who take traditional developmental math courses.

This paper explores how technology is integrated into developmental education programming and considerations for institutional leaders when deciding whether and how to integrate technology in developmental education.

This paper describes key features of CUNY Start mathematics and how it differs from traditional developmental education.

This paper examines factors within the community college context that affect the experiences and academic outcomes of the English learner population broadly and students who enroll in ESL courses in particular.

Written in conjunction with the Education Commission of the States, this brief provides an overview of multiple measures assessment and placement and describes how several states are implementing the approach.

This report describes the Mathematics Pathways to Completion project developed by the Charles A. Dana Center and the condititions that facilitate the statewide implementation of math pathways reforms.

This brief, written in collaboration with the Education Commission of the States, describes three math pathways models, lays out the evidence for their effectiveness, and gives recommendations for the effective implementation of math pathways.

This report from the Center for the Analysis for Postsecondary Readiness (CAPR) examines implementation of a multiple measures placement system at seven State University of New York community colleges and presents results on first-term impacts.

This report describes the early findings of a random assignment evaluation and implementation study of CUNY Start by CCRC, MDRC, and the City University of New York.

Drawing on lessons from 10 Minnesota and Wisconsin colleges that piloted multiple measures systems for placing students into developmental and college-level courses, this guide provides recommendations for other colleges interested in implementing or testing their own multiple measures systems.

This chapter discusses the importance of scrutinizing the outcomes of developmental education reforms across race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, gender, and level of developmental need.

In this article, the authors posit that a reframing of academic preparedness is warranted, and they outline three potential strategies for addressing academic underpreparedness beyond the structural and curricular reforms to developmental education taking place in many colleges.

This chapter in Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research reviews the structure and effectiveness of traditional developmental education and provides a history of first-, second-, and third-wave reforms and research on those approaches.

This ECS/CAPR brief discusses the importance of and challenges surrounding developmental education and suggests ways in which policymakers can address these challenges.

This article examines a study on the effectiveness of remediation for community college students who are identified as having the lowest skills in math using transcript data from a state community college system.

This CAPR working paper provides an overview of the history of college placement testing, with a focus on nonselective colleges. The authors discuss the limitations of placement tests, the consequences of placement errors, and the movement toward changing systems of placement; a typology of approaches to assessment and placement is also described.

Using interview, focus group, and case study data, this paper documents the perceptions and experiences of faculty members in the midst of statewide reform efforts in Virginia and North Carolina to integrate developmental reading and writing courses.

Using site visit data from three community colleges and four high schools, this paper explores how the institutional context of the high schools compared with that of the colleges in ways that may have affected the implementation and efficacy of computer-mediated mathematics.

This journal article examines the impacts of different levels of developmental reading and writing on students’ academic outcomes.

This chapter describes the structure and implementation of a redesign of developmental education in the Virginia Community College System, discusses preliminary descriptive findings from an evaluation of the redesign, and shares lessons for the field.

This practice guide presents six evidence-based recommendations for college and university faculty, administrators, and advisors working to improve the success of students academically underprepared for college.

Using longitudinal student-unit record data linked to wage record data, this paper estimates the labor market returns to developmental credits versus college-level credits in two states.