Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Mark Your Calendars!

The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching is hosting another free webinar with updates on their developmental math work, Statway and Quantway. The webinar is scheduled for Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 11am Pacific/2pm Eastern. Here’s a description of the webinar from their website:
During the broadcast, the presenters will: 
  • Provide an update on what students and faculty members are experiencing with these new pathways.
  • Explain how faculty and others have and can contribute to the development of the materials for these pathways.
  • Outline how Carnegie integrates "Productive Persistence" into developmental math courses.
  • Reveal how analytics is being used to inform future development.
  • Give details on how to get involved with this work in the future.
You can register here.

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Guest Post: Understanding and Reconciling the Opposing Forces that Shape Developmental Programming

Much developmental education research today focuses on which cog needs the most grease; in other words, how do we fix a system that everyone seems to agree is broken? In a developmental education working paper published by the Community College Research Center in November 2011, Shanna Smith Jaggars and Michelle Hodara take a different tack. In this description of a case study of the City University of New York’s six community colleges, they ask why the system is broken and propose a framework that can help institutions answer that fundamental question. Below, Shanna Smith Jaggers introduces the study and the new framework.

Those who attempt innovation in developmental education often find our efforts thwarted by administration or faculty who seem dead-set against change. Too often, we dismiss our detractors’ objections as springing from short-sightedness, or worse, sheer obstinacy. Yet if we do not make the effort to understand and validate the real (and often positive) motivations of the opposite camp, we are unlikely to make any progress. Based on a recent case study of a large urban community college system, Michelle Hodara and I have developed an “opposing forces framework” that may help innovators understand the conflicting motivations that shape developmental education. In today’s post, I want to focus on one key set of opposing forces: support of student progression versus enforcement of academic standards.

Nationwide, faculty and administrators all want to support students to succeed. Evidence is mounting that accelerated strategies (such as shortening sequences, or mainstreaming developmental students with additional supports) can help do this. While accelerated strategies vary, many of them are based on the fact that placement exams are notoriously imprecise in their assessments of students’ capabilities; such acceleration strategies work by allowing students to “place upward” -- tackling more difficult work than the placement exam would suggest that they should. And indeed, while some students will falter and fail in this more difficult environment, on the whole, upward-placement methods allow more students to enter and successfully complete gatekeeper math and English courses than would be possible under the traditional sequence.

Why would anyone oppose such a strategy? It allows far more students to succeed in the long term, and at a lower cost to both the institution and the student. To put the problem into perspective, however, consider the fact that upward-placement methods are fundamentally equivalent to lowering your institution’s placement cut score -- and then imagine how people would feel about that. In our case study, although all faculty were passionate about student success, they were also universally uncomfortable with the notion of cut score decreases, based on three types of worries. The first worry is that the school would be perceived as having poor academic quality. The second is that introductory college-level courses would be harder to teach due to wide variation in student preparedness. Strongly related to that is the third worry: that a flood of less-prepared students would give faculty the uncomfortable choice of either failing more students or relaxing their standards. All three worries reflect the generalized fear that teaching quality, grading rigor, and academic standards would decline at the college -- in ways that would fail students, exhaust faculty, and disappoint the community. Viewed in that light, acceleration strategies could be understood as an existential threat to hardworking and committed faculty across the campus. Who can blame them, then, for opposing your work?

Overall, our case study illustrated that everyone involved in developmental education is passionately committed to the greater good, but they tend to fall on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of what they think should be done to advance the greater good. I think this study has convinced us that it may be impossible to fix developmental education unless administrators and faculty sit down and candidly talk with one another, in a context that allows people to bring some of these fears out into the open and work through them. If these conversations happen, then colleges can work out strategies to support progression while at the same time enforcing standards. For example, to ensure high standards in accelerated developmental courses and introductory college-level courses, faculty could work together to develop common learning outcomes across sections of each course, collaboratively creating standards that are meaningful, clearly defined, and maintained at a high level. If faculty are having trouble getting their students to meet the defined learning outcomes, there would be more clear information about exactly where students are struggling, and which teachers have materials and techniques that seem more helpful in certain areas. And rather than punishing faculty who have low pass rates or pressuring them to increase their pass rates, departments could support faculty to experiment and learn together about strategies that seem to be effective with struggling students.

In our case study, we discuss the tension between progression and standards in more detail, as well as two additional tensions (centralization vs. autonomy, and efficient vs. effective assessment). For more details and recommendations, I encourage you to take a look at our report: The Opposing Forces that Shape Developmental Education: Assessment, Placement, and Progression at CUNY Community Colleges.


Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Guest Post: Allied Forces

Today’s post is our third installment of “SCALERS: Round 2.” Originally created by Paul Bloom at the Duke University Fuqua School of Business’s Center for the Advancement of Social Entrepreneurship, the SCALERS model identifies seven organizational capacities that support the successful scaling of a social enterprise: staffing, communicating, alliance-building, lobbying, earnings generation, replicating impact, and stimulating market forces. (You can read an introduction to each driver in our first SCALERS series.)

Now, we’re asking DEI colleges about how particular SCALERS drivers have contributed to their scaling efforts. So far, we’ve covered staffing and communicating. Below, Nick Bekas of Valencia College in Orlando, Florida, shares what he’s learned about successful alliance-building over the years.


Ten years ago, we had an initiative at Valencia focused on developmental math. It failed. However, it did not fail because of its ineffectiveness in improving student learning. It failed because of people, and no one person could be blamed. It was really an organizational failure. I watched from the sidelines as a promising initiative that showed real learning gains for students unraveled because the key players never developed working relationships. (Note: Watching from the sidelines makes you part of the failure. Had I stepped on the field and tripped someone, I might have made a difference.) One would think that professors who are committed to learning could put aside philosophical differences or perceived slights for the sake of improving student learning. This one failure taught me a very important lesson about the importance of building alliances. All relationships are personal even if they are professional. In my checkered past at Valencia directing a variety of initiatives both successful and not so successful, here is what I have learned about building alliances.

1. Find the acid drippers.
We use this term for people at our institution who will criticize everything even if they proposed it. By seeking their advice and participation, I head off issues down the road. This is not to say that we will agree on the direction and scope of the project or that they will actively participate, but it does make them part of the conversation and validates their voice. I don’t try and convert them; I listen to them, hear what they have to say, and tell them how they can help. If they choose not to, it’s on them, but at least I tried. I have found that I get less interference and more cooperation even though it is mostly passive. And maybe on the next project, they will participate.

2. Engage people on the ideas, not just the process or the product.
If I want an initiative to get off the ground, I don’t talk just about the initiative. I focus on the ideas informing the initiative and get people to have conversation about the ideas. When you give someone a finished product and ask them to comment on it, you have already divested them from it. Educational initiatives are not new products; you are not showing them the latest version of a Snickers bar and asking for comment. You are asking their opinion on something they are experts on, so they want to be part of the process, not just the product. Ideas excite people.

3. Build on natural alliances.
You have to know your institution and your people. Find people of like mind and purpose and put them at the core of your work. I am not advocating for a “clone” army, but for a group of people who are philosophically aligned with the goals of your project. This group should be the “true believers” who help you shape the scope and direction of your work. You can then use them as “subversive” agents to help build support for your project. The director of a project or the lead on a project is often at a disadvantage when it comes to getting buy-in simply because he or she is the face of the project and not a person. I am not “Nick” but DEI. However, someone else talking about DEI is perceived differently and may get more of a response. A project director is perceived as having an agenda, which is true, but sometimes this perception precludes engagement with different groups, especially if it is not immediately clear how the goals of the initiative align with their everyday work.

4. Tap the “newbies” and “oldies.”
New faculty are always willing to participate and bring fresh ideas to the game. They see things through a different lens because they have not been part of the organization long enough to have been assimilated into its culture. They are also willing to be “exploited” for a small stipend and food because they are excited to be part of something, and if they are adjuncts, they need the small stipend and food. Also, veteran faculty are sometimes not involved because they are not asked to be. You can’t assume that they just don’t want to participate because they don’t respond to an all call. You have to give a personal invitation and tell them why you need their experience and expertise.

5. Be persistent and consistent.

I learned this from my kids. It applies to other forms of life as well. People crave consistency and reward persistence. I don’t stalk, but I do suddenly show up at an office to say, “Hi.”  You have to work at building relationships, and you have to be consistent in your message. This is the only way to change behaviors and to get wider participation. I have failed at this with my kids up to this point, but I have been pretty good with my colleagues.

Nick Bekas is DEI project director and professor of English at Valencia College.

Friday, December 9, 2011

Guest Post: We're Getting the Band Back Together!

The Developmental Education Initiative is all about sharing good ideas and successful practices so that more states, colleges, and students can take advantage of what’s working. There are many ways to do this across a campus, a system, or the entire community college sector. One example comes from Houston Community College (HCC). Last month, HCC held a conference that brought together developmental educators and national experts to focus on accelerating progress across the state. Below, Maria Strauss, director of instructional initiatives at HCC, recaps the conference.

Houston Community College hosted our third statewide developmental education conference, “Texas takes Developmental Education by the Horns” on November 18, with almost 200 participants from 18 Texas community colleges. The focus and theme of the conference was “Accelerating Achievement” [Great name! --Eds.]. Participants were organized according to their teaching fields and areas of specialization as we listened to speakers and enjoyed guided “table talk” during a working lunch.
 
Our first speaker, Joe Cuseo addressed academic advising and first-time-in college students’ need for college knowledge. Cuseo compared colleges with hospitals to illustrate the necessity of continued commitment to developmental education: if hospitals only admitted healthy patients their success rates would be great, and if colleges only admitted college-ready students the need for developmental education would be extinct; but with over 60 percent of community college students in need of some form of remediation, we must find ways to remediate them and make them college ready.

Hunter Boylan was our second speaker; Boylan reviewed the research on the best and promising practices for developmental programs. He was a strong advocate for improving students’ knowledge of assessment tests and their consequences on placement. He recommended making refresher courses available before giving students placement tests. He also argued for the new model of reducing the number of developmental courses and combining developmental English with reading courses. He suggested that colleges develop more 5-to-8 week refresher courses, provide intensive short-term open-entry/open-exit courses, and pair college-level courses with study strategies courses focusing on content.

We also heard from Karen Graham and Linda Thompson who are the current review coordinators for the National Association for Developmental Education (NADE). They discussed the accreditation principles of NADE certification and encouraged all participating colleges at the conference to consider going through the process.

We concluded the conference with Cynthia Ferrell, the director of the Texas Developmental Education Initiative state policy team. Ferrell brought information from Austin about what is ahead for our state. For example, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board is considering adopting one assessment test for the entire state to determine college placement. She also announced several leadership groups across the state that will be looking at developmental education redesign and making recommendations for state-wide strategies.

Everyone had the opportunity to interact with likeminded colleagues and share promising practices. After every presentation we had a question and answer session so participants could pose questions to the presenters. We all learned and reflected on our work with developmental students. We are already planning our fourth statewide conference for the spring of 2012!

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Guest Post: The Benefit Bank Helps Community College Students Claim Work Supports

We’ve looked before at different ways to help students build a safety net that enables them to meet school obligations as well as personal, family, and work obligations, including financial counseling and financial literacy instruction. Today’s post from Michael Schultz, MDC VISTA, details another MDC initiative that helps connect individuals to available financial supports that could make the difference between a completed semester or an early withdrawal.

Consider this: an estimated $70 billion in work supports goes unclaimed by eligible households in the United States each year. Unbelievable, right? Community college students are often eligible for federal work supports beyond financial aid, yet lack of knowledge and barriers to access result in federally apportioned dollars going unclaimed.

Most notably, many community college students may be eligible for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps. In order to be eligible for SNAP, full-time college students between the ages of 18-49 must meet at least one of the following criteria:
  • They work at least 20 hours a week
  • They work any number of hours in a federal or state work study program
  • They are a married parent with at least one dependent under the age of 6
  • They are a single parent with at least one dependent under the age of 12
Students must also meet the program’s income and asset limits that vary from state to state in terms of definitions, exemptions, and deductions.

Another work support likely available to community college students is the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). Available to anyone who earns income during the year, the EITC is fully refundable, meaning even households that owe no taxes can still receive the EITC as part of their refund. The greatest benefit is to households with children. The maximum credit for a household with one child is $3,094, with two children it is $5,112; with three or more children, it is $5,751. Households without children are also eligible: a single person without children, over the age of 25, and earning roughly between $6,000 and $7,500 is estimated to receive the maximum $464 tax credit. The IRS estimates that as many as 1 in 5 eligible households fail to claim the EITC. This population almost certainly includes many community college students who don’t realize they are eligible. (Check out the EITC Carolinas website, an MDC initiative, for more information.)

MDC’s Works Supports Initiative seeks to connect eligible populations, like community college students, to the federal and state benefits for which they are eligible. This national initiative uses an online service called The Benefit Bank® (TBB) in partnership with community and faith-based organizations to help clients fill out benefit applications, e-file taxes, and complete the FAFSA. The Benefit Bank allows individuals to complete multiple applications in a user-friendly format with simple prompts and gateway questions that determine when more information is required. With TBB, a client can receive help filling out benefit or tax forms at a familiar community organization with the trusted assistance of a counselor. With confidence, knowledge of the application process, and the proper forms in hand, TBB helps to make it easier to connect low- and middle-income households to work supports.

Benefit applications can currently be completed using The Benefit Bank in ten states: Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Texas. Federal benefits are accessed through state agencies with states having flexibility to shape their state’s version of the program. Thus, to complete benefits applications, TBB requires partnerships with the appropriate state agencies. Affiliate partners in each state help to build the necessary partnerships with state agencies and with the community organizations whose trained counselors use TBB to serve their clients. To receive benefits, the completed applications must be accepted by the proper state agencies that then determine eligibility, including checking the paperwork and identification.

Of immediate use in all states is TBB’s Quick Check feature, a one-minute benefit screener that estimates the likelihood of eligibility for a range of benefits. Also available in all states is TBB Self Serve, a free e-File service for federal taxes paired with a FAFSA application. The key strength of TBB is its ability to take the proper information from one form and pre-populate another benefit form. For example, after completing taxes using TBB, a significant portion of the tax information on the FAFSA will already be filled in when a user completes the application. This “bundling” saves time and is kept secure within each client’s individual password-protected portal.

In a time when community college students are hard pressed to make ends meet, connecting students with financial aid and works supports can help students stay in school. The Benefit Bank makes connecting students to works supports like SNAP and the EITC that much easier.

Michael Schultz is an AmeriCorps VISTA at MDC.