The intensifying attention to college and career readiness of late poses many challenges for public education, but it also presents opportunities for innovative changes in the quality and type of education provided to students. To take full advantage, educators must have a clear answer to this question: What does college and career readiness mean…

"Perspective" is a monthly e-newsletter presenting news and views from Achieve. This month's issue commences with a commentary assessing the meaning of college- and career-readiness. In doing so, it addresses some of the questions Achieve gets asked most frequently, including: What subjects are most important in defining "Readiness"? What does…

We've all gotten them--the student emails that make you question your decision to get into this profession. The title of this column says it all. If we want students to meet our expectations, we must give them instruction on what we expect. Technology should be used to help us meet our academic goals, not just to cater to students' love of…

Early in my career someone else reported that the best indicator of success in calculus-based physics (CBP) at our school was whether students had taken mathematics in a certain region of New Brunswick. I sat down with a very longtime mathematics teacher and asked him what he thought students should know in mathematics after high school to succeed…

All too often, the terms "career ready" and "college ready" are used interchangeably, and discussions around career readiness are limited to traditional academic skills that allow students to successfully enroll in postsecondary education. While there is no debate that a rigorous level of academic proficiency, especially in math and literacy, is…

This paper critically examines traditional means of assessing college students' need for remediation and suggests as a replacement an expanded definition of college readiness, where readiness is more complex than rudimentary content knowledge and more multifaceted than a single cut point. The paper presents and explains four dimensions of…

This article discusses how school districts in California collaborate with higher education to boost college readiness and access. In Long Beach, educators from all three major institutions of learning--elementary, middle and high schools, the local university and the community college--worked together to align standards and expectations across…

Low-income high school graduates are less likely to get to a postsecondary institution than their middle and upper-income peers (U.S. Department of Education, 2000). Students who do enter a four-year institution do not have the necessary academic preparation to succeed and obtain a professional degree. The study examined how two national college…

Following a national trend, state policy has focused on accountability measures such as high-stakes high school exit exams, standards-based reforms, and graduation curriculum requirements. Yet the effect of these accountability policies on students' readiness for college is relatively untested. In a multilevel model (students within states), the…

Under-preparedness of students entering university has become increasingly challenging as South African universities struggle to ensure student success where schooling no longer provides sufficient preparation for university. Understanding the gap between being eligible and being ready for university study is of critical importance. Using Conley's…

In 2007, the Illinois General Assembly passed Public Act 0950694, "The College and Career Readiness Pilot Act", in an effort to reduce remediation within Illinois' community colleges. An important objective of this legislation was to better prepare students to be successful in transitioning from high school to college. According to the…

This "Fourth Annual Report Card" marks a new chapter for the Boston Opportunity Agenda. For the first time, the Boston Opportunity Agenda is reporting student outcomes across Boston Public Schools and Catholic and charter schools. This provides a comprehensive baseline view of the education pipeline for the city's K-12 students. The…

Since the early 1990s, the federal government has required colleges to track and report graduation rates for all first-time, full-time degree- or certificate-seeking students. The most widely used figure tracks students for 150 percent of the time they expect to take to graduate. For bachelor's degree programs, students are considered graduates if…

The 2014 edition of the "Annual Condition of Education Report" marks the 25th anniversary of the report. Much has changed in the passing quarter century since the 1st edition was released in 1990. Most importantly, the "Condition of Education Report" allows the citizens of Iowa to explore trend data and determine what has…

In today's knowledge driven economy a college degree is critical to the success of a competitive workforce. Yet in 2008, only 19 percent of Latinos, 29 percent of blacks, and 39 percent of whites 25 and over had earned an associate degree or higher. At a time when all students will have to accelerate success to meet national degree completion…