This study investigated students' learning performances in reading and academic achievement after an experimental group took a reading improvement course in which vocabulary and comprehension improvement exercises were derived from their content area textbooks and a comparison group took a general reading improvement course with materials traditionally used in similar reading courses at many colleges. The subjects were eighty students enrolled in a college preparatory program which provided preparation for college studies for students who had poor high school achievement or who had been away from school for a long time and needed a refresher program. The comparative effectiveness of the two approaches was determined by analyzing the semester's mean cumulative grade-point averages and the mean achievement scores in the three content area courses using a two-tailed t test. Both groups made significant gains in reading scores from pretest to posttest on the Nelson-Denny Reading Test. There were no significant differences between groups in grade-point averages, reading improvement scores, or achievement in the writing or mathematics courses. There were significant differences in favor of the experimental group in achievement in the science course. (Author/MKM)