The Location of Developmental Education in Community Colleges: A Discussion of the Merits of Mainstreaming vs. Centralization

This study compares mainstreaming and centralization, two ways in which community colleges organize developmental education. Based on previous literature, the two models are compared in terms of instructional quality, ancillary services, teacher characteristics, student reactions, and reputation of remediation.

Pending empirical evidence for the superiority of one model to another, recommendations are offered to college administrators and state policymakers for maximizing the effectiveness of each one.

This article appeared in Community College Review, vol. 20, issue 1.

A related brief, The Organization of Developmental Education: In or out of Academic Departments?, is also available.