Nonpartisan Education Review / Articles
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February 2021
Texas Developmental
Education Crisis
Sharon
D. Simpson, Ed.D.
ESOL
(English for Speakers of Other Languages) Adjunct Faculty
University
of Mary Hardin-Baylor
ssimpson@umhb.edu
List
of Abbreviations
CC Community
College
DE Developmental
Education
IB International
Baccalaureate Organization
STAAR State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness
THECB Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
TEA Texas
Education Agency
TEKS Texas
Essential Knowledge and Skills
TAC Texas
Administrative Code
TSI Texas
Success Initiative Assessment
Legislation, Assessments, and Projects Referenced
1984 Texas Education
Code [TEC] §21.721, Grade Requirement for Advancement or Course Credit
1993 Grants to Texas
schools for retention reduction ($5 million)
2007 Texas House Bill
1, Section 50 (“Rider 50”) to create pilot Developmental Education programs
2009 Texas Senate Bill
1, Rider 45 to promote increased post-secondary education Enrollments
2010 Developmental
Education Demonstration Projects (2-year span)
2011 State of Texas
Assessments of Academic Readiness instituted (standardized tests) and 2012–2017
Statewide Developmental Education Plan created
2013 Texas Success
Initiative Assessment (TSI) instituted (college-entrance exam)
Texas Developmental Education Crisis
Developmental education (DE) in
colleges has been the subject of considerable research because of the poor
academic outcomes of its students. Low
graduation rates have caused many to label the issue the DE crisis (Sullivan,
2017). Another group of researchers
analogized the issue as follows: “Our first premise is that if underprepared
postsecondary students were a disease, the Center for Disease Control would
declare a public health emergency” (Booth et al., 2014, p. 8). Providing training in reading, writing, and
math, and DE is the primary method of college access for students with poor
scholastic performance. However, many
have decried the failure of DE thus far in serving as a transformational,
affordable remedial tool and in reducing ethnic and racial gaps in academic
achievement (Charles A. Dana Center, Complete College America, Inc., Education
Commission of the States, Jobs for the Future, 2012). For DE students entering community colleges
(CC) in 2006, only 8.4% graduated by 2009 (Texas Higher Education Coordinating
Board [THECB], 2018, Jan. 15). In the
same year, the THECB responded to Riders 45 and 50, state-legislated mandates,
to improve DE outcomes by developing Texas’ first statewide DE plan (Texas
Workforce Investment Council, 2010).
The DE Plan contained six goals
including providing funds for conducting DE trial projects, training DE
educators, and increasing course quality and efficacy (THECB, 2009). Rider 50 also contained instruction to the
Board to produce a DE best-practices report (THECB, 2013, Jan. 1). The Board supplied that report with findings
from a study of DE in Texas entitled 2009 Developmental Education Program Survey
(THECB, 2009). The survey data augmented
a literature review of DE research from the previous 20 years. Using those two sources, the Board then
produced requests for applications for pilot DE programs where educators would
try to improve student outcomes by experimenting with new course and support
interventions (THECB, 2013, Jan. 1). In
2010, the Board funded 2-year Developmental Education Demonstration Projects in
four universities and the following CC districts: Alamo, El Paso, Lone Star,
San Jacinto, and Tarrant County (THECB, 2013, Jan. 1).
The following year, the Texas 82nd
Legislature instructed the Board to develop a DE plan that would improve DE
student outcomes while being cost-effective.
The Board then created the 2012–2017 Statewide Developmental Education
Plan containing goals and objectives for DE programs based on the 2009 DE Plan,
the Developmental Education Demonstration Projects pilots, and other research
findings (THECB, 2012, Dec. 1). The plan
contained direction for higher education DE departments, and a vision:
By fall 2017, Texas will
significantly improve the success of underprepared students by addressing their
individualized needs through reliable diagnostic assessment, comprehensive
support services, and non-traditional interventions, to include modular, mainstreaming,
non-course competency-based, technologically-based, and integrated
instructional models (THECB, 2012, p. 7).
Another survey, the 2011
Developmental Education Program Survey, provided Texas DE progress data (THECB,
2012). Both surveys showed 95% or more
of educators (n = 67 both years) used placement test scores to indicate college
readiness before DE enrollment. However,
79% of colleges did not require DE students to retake the same placement test
before exiting the DE program. Also,
around 20% of reporting DE programs had no plan in place for DE course
evaluation. The survey also showed
colleges were using a wide variety of placement tests. The Board then received a legislative
directive to create a statewide placement test better suited for college
readiness standards in Texas (Booth et al., 2014). In 2013, the Board instituted the use of the
Texas Success Initiative Assessment (TSI).
Although students with sufficiently high scores on other tests, such as
the ACT or SAT, can avoid taking the TSI, it is the primary placement tool
currently in use (THECB, 2017, October).
In 2014, the Public Policy Research
Institute at Texas A&M University analyzed the results of the pilot
projects and found only five of the nine projects produced improvements in DE
outcomes (Booth et al.) with course acceleration and various support systems
(Figure 1). Two of the four
universities, and three of the five CCs had success, which researchers defined
not as graduation but as students passing DE or core classes. San Jacinto CC, Tarrant County CC, and Lone
Star CC showed increases of 12%, 4%, and 2%, respectively (Booth et al.,
2014). El Paso CC had a decrease of 13%,
and Alamo CC showed no meaningful change.
Overall, 62% of community college students passed their DE courses.
Figure 1. DE course pass rate improvements of Developmental Education Demonstration Projects.
Figure 1. Compiled from Booth, et al., 2014.
There was not a focus on DE program
exit testing or curriculum standards outside of teacher collaboration,
instructional strategies, and academic support suggestions. Based on the project findings, the
researchers recommended that DE programs contain accelerated classes, but only
for higher proficiency DE students with a strong study ethic. They also suggested administrators offer DE
courses with variable week durations.
However, the Board doubted educators statewide would be able to
replicate the multimillion-dollar grant expenditures (THECB, 2013, Jan. 1). Also, large scale, meta-analysis research from
Columbia Teacher’s College showed various DE models had overall neutral to
negative medium- and long-term effects on DE writing student success (2014).For
students who pass DE writing courses while lacking college-ready writing
skills, it is not known if their course instructors pass them due to low course
rigor, administrative pressure, or social grading. The following contains a brief historical
overview of issues surrounding primary, secondary, and college writing
standards, college preparatory efforts, and writing in the workforce.
Lower Education Writing Standards,
Tests, Outcomes, and Contingency Standards
For Texas public schools, the Texas
Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) compose state standards. These standards are defined for English II, a
high school course with a standardized test whose students must pass to
graduate (19 Tex. Admin. Code §110.37):
(A) plan a piece of writing
appropriate for various purposes and audiences by generating ideas through a
range of strategies such as brainstorming, journaling, reading, or discussing;
(B) develop drafts into a focused, structured, and coherent piece of writing in
timed and open-ended situations; (C) revise drafts to improve clarity,
development, organization, style, diction, and sentence effectiveness,
including use of parallel constructions and placement of phrases and dependent
clauses; (D) edit drafts using standard English conventions; (E) publish written work for
appropriate audiences.
Student perspectives can offer
insight into understanding how secondary teachers may navigate state writing
standards. First-year English
Composition students in one study at George Washington University reported
having practiced synthesizing and writing summary-responses during high
school. However, higher level writing
such as criticism, modifying writing for given audiences, and problem-solution
identification tasks were rare (Carnegie Mellon University, 2016). Other research from Tyre
(2012) revealed secondary English teachers share a preference for creative over
rhetorical writing assignments. Another
study found the length of high school writing assignments never exceeded five
pages in most teachers’ assignments (Sanoff,
2006). In significant contrast, the
International Baccalaureate (IB), a high school honors diploma, requires a
senior thesis of up to 4,000 words (IB, 2004, Sept.).
Testing
The State of Texas Assessments of
Academic Readiness (STAAR) are designed to align with the standards above. The TEA denotes the STAAR as the “foundation
of the accountability system for Texas public education” (2017a, p. 4) and
quotes the 1984 state education law prohibiting social promotion or passing a
student who has academically failed. To
show proficiency in writing and to graduate from high school, students must
pass English Assessments within the STAAR.
The test contains a writing prompt, which external reviewers score, as
well as multiple-choice questions of sentence and word level errors.
Outcomes
Data from 2011 showed only 24% of
high school seniors nationwide demonstrated proficient writing (National
Assessment of Educational Progress, 2011), and those demonstrating advanced
writing composed less than five percent of the student body. In Texas, results for the fall of 2017 showed
that out of 16 possible points for composition, high school students who
completed English II had an average score of 7.6 points, or 48% (TEA, 2017c). That number roughly equals the percentage of
graduates testing into DE courses upon college enrollment (THECB, 2019,
July). In addition, DE admissions are
not exclusive to low-scoring high school graduates. Forty percent of students who graduate high
school with self-reported A grade point averages have failed to pass Texas’
main college entrance test in math, reading, and/or writing upon college
enrollment (Center for Community College Student Engagement, 2016).
Contingencies
Despite
low STAAR pass rates and subsequent low TSI pass rates, over the past 30 years,
the TEA and the State Board of Education have instituted a myriad of pathways
to avoid student retention. In the early
1990s, schools received grants to produce zero retentions of first and second
graders. In 1996, students who failed
the STAAR precursor, Texas Assessment of Academic Skills tests, could advance
based on attendance in an extended school year program (TEA, 2017a). Parents who requested retention for their children
had to attend meetings with school officials who often tried to dissuade
them. Currently, in kindergarten, first,
second, and third grades, Texas primary school educators retain only 2% to 4%,
yet nationwide approximately 30% of early elementary level students fail to
meet grade standards (TEA, 2017). In
grades four to eight, 0.4% to 0.8% of Texas students repeat grades (TEA,
2017). School officials and education
rights advocates cite overcrowded classrooms, psychological harm, and
insignificant benefit as rationales against retaining elementary students
(Radcliffe & Blakinger, 2017). Mechanisms exist within Texas school law, as
well, whereby students failing standardized tests continue to advance for most
grades. The TEA requires students to repeat
only at grades five and eight if they fail the STAAR test for their grade. All other students who fail the test may
continue to the next grade and retake the test later. For high school seniors who do not pass
required courses, Texas state law states the following:
A student in 11th or 12th grade who
did not perform satisfactorily on the STAAR test in no more than two courses
may be permitted to graduate if an individual graduation committee determines
the student is qualified to do so. Tex.
Educ. Code §§ 28.0258, 39.023(c); 19 Tex. Admin. Code §101.3022.
Also, an Admission, Review, and
Dismissal Committee can decide on STAAR test waivers or accommodations for
those classified as special education students (TEA, 2018). Beyond providing waivers and committee
decisions to promote students, between 2011 and 2015, school administrators
ignored STAAR test results three of the years since its inception due to
undecided standards or test vendor problems.
In the spring of 2018, another widespread testing computer glitch
affected more than 100,000 students taking the test (Platoff,
2018). Additionally, although in 2011
the STAAR test replaced a prior state test to provide “more rigor” (p. 4), EOCs
went from 15 required subjects to graduate, to five in 2013, to three in
2015—provided a committee agreed— (TEA, 2018).
Moreover, when juniors or seniors fail STAAR tests, relatively few
repeat a grade. Students are permitted
to fail a STAAR three times. The
following Texas Education Code segment lists failure contingency plans.
TEC §28.0211(a-1) requires school
districts to provide accelerated instruction in the applicable subject area
each time a student fails to perform satisfactorily on an assessment
administered in grades 3–8 (i.e., who does not achieve Level II: Satisfactory
Academic Performance). Similarly, TEC §39.025(b-1) requires school districts to
provide accelerated instruction to each student who fails to perform
satisfactorily on a STAAR EOC assessment (TEA, 2016).
If a student fails a STAAR three times,
a 4-person committee can promote that student by requiring remedial work and/or
a project. Similarly, when students fail
courses in middle or high school, many take extra training that the school
provides (TEA, 2018, April), after which their teachers deem them to possess
the knowledge or skill required, and they continue to advance with their
peers. Alternatively, if students can
pass the TSI in math, reading, and writing, they can advance or graduate. Thus, while the STAAR indicates the readiness
of students to advance grade levels, TEA members have created many ways to
sidestep the consequences of failing.
Despite a 1984 Texas law and a federal law banning social promotion, or
passing students who fail to show required skills, (TEA, 2017a), around 90% of
those who failed STAARs in the lower grades in 2013 advanced to the next grade;
of those students, only one-fifth passed their next STAARs (Diagnostic
Learning, 2016). Additionally,
approximately 85% of Texas high school graduates received a diploma designated
as the Recommended or Advanced High School Program, representing students ready
for college scholastics (TEA, 2017b), yet 50% or more of the graduates were not
able to demonstrate college-entry skills by passing the TSI. Thus, while there are standards for
successful secondary school completion that match or exceed those determined
necessary for college level entrance, and though proficiency tests seem
rigorous enough, around half of all Texas students graduate high school without
the knowledge and skills to succeed in postsecondary coursework (THECB, 2019,
July).
Higher Education Writing Standards,
Tests, Outcomes, and Contingency Standards
Texas’ College and Career Readiness
Standards for English writing are as follows:
Compose a variety of texts that
demonstrate clear focus, the logical development of ideas in well-organized
paragraphs, and the use of appropriate language that advances the author’s
purpose. 1. Determine effective
approaches, genres, rhetorical techniques, and media that demonstrate
understanding of the writer’s purpose and audience. 2. Generate ideas and
gather information relevant to the topic and purpose, keeping careful records
of outside sources. 3. Evaluate relevance, quality, sufficiency, and depth of
preliminary ideas and information, organize material generated, and formulate
thesis. 4. Recognize the importance of revision as the key to effective
writing. 5. Edit writing for proper voice, tense, and syntax, assuring that it
conforms to Standard American English, when appropriate (TEKS, n.d.).
For students unable to pass such
standards, state objectives, four through eight, for DE Integrated Reading and
Writing courses are their next challenge.
As viewable in a document of THECB (n.d. -a.), the DE standards are similar
to the College and Career Readiness Standards, and perhaps lesser in scope than
the Texas’ high school writing objectives:
4. Describe and apply insights
gained from reading and writing a variety of texts. 5. Compose a variety of texts that demonstrate
reading comprehension, clear focus, logical development of ideas, and use of
appropriate language that advance the writer’s purpose. 6. Determine and use effective approaches and
rhetorical strategies for given reading and writing situations. 7. Generate ideas and gather information
relevant to the topic and purpose, incorporating the ideas and words of other
writers in student writing using established strategies. 8. Evaluate relevance and quality of ideas and
information in recognizing, formulating, and developing a claim
(pp. 250–251).
Testing
When high school graduates enroll in
college, they typically must show college readiness through a standardized
test. Fourteen states have standardized
placement tests (Bettinger & Long, 2005),
and 12 states have state-mandated cut-off scores. For college level placement, Texas’ main
assessment is the TSI. In 2015, a lower
cut score of 340 for multiple choice writing questions replaced the previous
350 cut score (THECB, 2017, October) for college entrants, which had already
been lowered from an initial cut score of 363.
With a score range of 310–390, 340 represents less than 50%
accuracy. The essay section score
indicating college readiness is 5 out of a range of 0–8 (TSI Practice Test,
n.d.), or a 4 can qualify a student if the multiple-choice writing score is at
least 340 (College Board, 2014). The
Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), one of the tests accepted in place of the TSI
in Texas, had a national writing score average of 489/800 (2011), or 61% of possible
points (Leal, 2012). Students who score
480 on the SAT reading-writing segment are exempt from taking the TSI (Texas
Admin. Code § 4.54, 2016).
For DE students, another high-stakes
assessment is the one whereby they exit DE.
Students who take more DE courses than average face an increase in
tuition. Until recently, the state of
Texas subsidized a maximum of 27 course hours of DE. As of the fall of 2018, though, the maximum
course hours dropped to 18 (THECB, 2018).
Along with bringing financial impacts, DE exit assessments can also
bring placement consequences. Students
who exit DE programs prematurely can fail core classes. After passing three levels of DE courses,
fewer than one-third of students passed first-year English Composition (Teachers College Columbia University,
2014). Thus, decisions of
college-readiness and the methods for arriving at those decisions have great
impact. However, the exit process can
vary greatly depending on which college a student attends. The Texas Administrative Code Rule §4.59
titled Determination of Readiness to Perform Entry-Level Freshman Coursework states:
An institution shall determine when
a student is ready to perform entry-level freshman coursework using: (1)
Developmental education coursework and/or intervention learning; (2) Student
performance on one or more appropriate assessments, including scores resulting
from a student’s retaking of the TSI Assessment; and (3) Student qualification
for one or more TSI exemptions as outlined in §4.54 of this title (relating to
Exemptions, Exceptions, and Waivers) (para. 1).
As shown, students can exit DE programs based on TSI test
scores, exemptions, or by completing an intervention. An intervention may
include tutoring or other short-term support strategies or projects
(Morales-Vale, 2017, October). Clearly,
students exiting DE by completing an intervention or course work could have far
different writing skills than those who passed standardized tests such as the
TSI or SAT. Those who cannot demonstrate
basic writing skills usually take mandatory DE courses. Many colleges nationwide now offer
corequisite enrollment in DE courses alongside first college-level courses so
as not to delay or discourage students.
Researchers found low self-esteem among students who were taking more
than one DE course (Martin, Goldwasser, & Harris, 2016).
High-Validity Testing. In contrast to DE programs where a single instructor may
assess a high-stakes final examination, other program administrators employ
measures that provide significantly higher validity of results. For example, the IB employs procedures that
provide a 95% confidence score of results, reflecting the likelihood of
experienced examiners marking the essay in very similar ways (IB, 2004,
Sept.). One of those validity measures
is the use of external examiners to grade a student’s culminating essay. Examiners undergo extensive and ongoing
moderation, or calibration, and there are different examiners for marking various
aspects of the essay. Braun’s study
(1988) confirmed the validity of using of co-raters, noting that though valid
raters disagreed regarding various details of student accuracy, overall ratings
would usually be similar. The SAT
employs and trains raters to follow identical scoring standards for the essay
test (SAT Suite of Assessments, 2018).
Along with validity, the IB considers proper assessments to include
equity (unbiased scoring regardless of race, ethnicity, educational background,
or other trait), manageability (related to student and teacher effort needed to
prepare for a particular test), and reliability (IB, 2004, Sept.). One description of the IB program from a
United Kingdom college administrator contains the following: “The IB is independent,
it is outside national influence and the meddling of successive education
ministers, and it has had zero grade inflation, which appeals to universities
looking for consistency” (IB, 2015, para. 3).
Sadler (2013) stressed the importance of such academic integrity.
The way in which academic
achievement standards are assured needs to be transparent to colleagues,
students, quality assurance agencies and the wider society. The pursuit of assured grades and academic
standards could, if successful, have far-reaching implications for teachers, graduates
and higher education institutions (p. 14).
Outcomes - Workforce Writing
The real proof of high school, DE,
and college-level course effectiveness is graduate performance in the
workplace. The societal expectation is
that college graduates have high levels of critical analysis, math, and
literacy skills, yet many newly-employed graduates lack the writing skills
needed in their jobs and must take additional training (College Board,
2014). Fink (2013) laid a disturbing
indictment on the status of higher education:
Students are not learning even basic
general knowledge, they are not developing higher-level cognitive skills, and
they are not retaining their knowledge well...there is no significant
difference between students who take courses and students who do not (p. 4).
Also, in a large-scale survey of 400
U.S. businesses, graduates from high schools, community colleges, and
universities rated deficient in writing (The Conference Board, Inc.,
Partnership for 21st Century Skills, Corporate Voices for Working Families,
& Society for Human Resource Management, 2006). Eighty-one percent of high school graduates,
46% of 2-year, and 26% of 4-year graduates performed poorly in job writing
(Figure 2). The survey findings also
reported the vast majority of business owners list employee writing skills as
being critical for job success by facilitating communication and
efficiency. Spelling and poor grammar
construction in various types of company reports and communiques were
common. The survey findings revealed
around 24% of businesses test job applicant writing skills before hiring. Hansen (2017) also noted approximately 33% of
the work force perform poorly on their writing responsibilities.
Figure 2. Graduates with poor writing in the
workforce.
Compiled from The Conference Board,
Inc., 2006.
The National Commission on Writing
noted most corporate professionals write 30% of a typical work day, and writing
skills are essential qualifiers for hiring and promoting (2004). The report also discussed the presence of a
“growing concern within the education, business, and policy-making communities
that the quality of writing in the United States was not what it should be”
(p. 3). Additionally, researchers
in Texas found a neutral impact of DE on various educational and labor markets
(Martorell & McFarlin, 2010). They
conducted a longitudinal, regression discontinuity study of approximately
250,000 Texas first-year English Composition college student outcomes from 1991
to 2000. By obtaining access to THECB and
testing vendor student-level data using encrypted social security numbers, they
tracked the students. Being a remedial
student of any type constituted the study’s major independent variable. They also analyzed data from Texas’
Unemployment Insurance system available from the Texas Workforce
Commission. DE writing correlated with
“large negative effects on most outcomes” (p. 23). The outcomes measured included graduation and
job earnings six and seven years after first enrolling in college (Martorell
& McFarlin, 2010).
Contingency Efforts
In the event that P–12 academic
standards and assessments do not serve to prevent high school students from
graduating without basic reading, math, and writing skills, contingency efforts
in the way of college-preparatory organizations and P–12 alignment networks
exist. Such efforts are not new. Higher education alignment efforts and
organizations have existed for centuries (Parker, Bustillos,
& Behringer, 2010). Nearly 40 such
organizations dedicated to student college readiness function in Texas alone
(Barnet et al., 2012). One such
organization, founded in the mid-1990s, is the American Diploma Project
Network, a 35-member state network (ADP Network, 2017).
Another category of interventions
addressing the DE issue is P–12 alignment of curriculum with higher education
institutions to obviate the need for DE.
Termed P16 Councils or Initiatives,
educators and others in a majority of states contribute to the formation of
legislative action and create networks across the educational spectrum in an
effort to produce college-ready students (Parker et al., 2010). However, despite the proliferation of
preparatory organizations and networks, high numbers of students continue to
demonstrate deficiencies in basic educational skills (Bettinger
& Long, 2005).
Conclusion
In light of unsatisfactory
educational outcomes in lower and higher education in Texas, the practice of
instituting progressively lower academic standards should be reconsidered. The continual stream of students who graduate
and demonstrate low proficiency in writing skills in the marketplace reflects
poorly on the academic integrity of their colleges and universities. It is inherent to the job of educators to be
gatekeepers, ensuring the academic proficiency of students who pass their
courses. If the issue of academic rigor,
which is necessary for high-level learning, fails to be a priority of
educational leaders, it is doubtful whether the current stream of students and
dollars will continue to flow to higher education institutions. If the line of rigor between respected
colleges and so-called degree paper mills begins to blur, educators may wake up
to a culture that is not willing to traverse traditional educational pathways
which are no more than a shadow of the intellectual fortresses of the
past. Rather than continuing to lower
educational standards, educational researchers and legislators should return to
the standards that made American schools and colleges the destination of choice
for many in the world: academic tasks that are challenging, testing methods
that are strict and valid, and degrees that employers trust to represent
graduates with critical and advanced skills.
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Citation: Simpson, S. (2021). Texas Developmental Education Crisis, Nonpartisan Education Review / Articles. Retrieved [date] from
https://nonpartisaneducation.org/Review/Articles/v17n1.htm
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