ERIC Number: EJ1460880
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2025-Mar
Pages: 29
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0361-0365
EISSN: EISSN-1573-188X
Available Date: 2025-02-13
Math Sorting: Unintended Consequences of Developmental Education Reforms in Community Colleges
Soumya Mishra1; Elise Swanson2; Elif Yucel1; Federick Ngo3; Tatiana Melguizo1; Cheryl Ching4
Research in Higher Education, v66 n2 Article 14 2025
Beginning in 2019, California community colleges were required to use multiple measures to determine students' placement into initial math courses. Community colleges also created structured BSTEM and liberal arts (SLAM) math pathways beginning in 2017. This contemporaneous implementation could reproduce racialized stratification in math course-taking. This study analyzes changes in math course-taking between Fall 2017 and Summer 2021 using multinomial logistic regression. We find that after the reforms, fewer students across racial/ethnic groups took developmental math and more students attempted SLAM and BSTEM math in the first year of enrollment. Students of color were more likely to take SLAM math and slightly less likely to take BSTEM math, even among academically prepared students. We find some evidence of racial tracking in the steeper increase in SLAM course-taking among Latina/o/x students compared to other racial/ethnic groups. We discuss implications for future policy and practice given these results.
Descriptors: Developmental Studies Programs, Educational Change, Community Colleges, College Mathematics, Minority Group Students, Student Characteristics
Springer. Available from: Springer Nature. One New York Plaza, Suite 4600, New York, NY 10004. Tel: 800-777-4643; Tel: 212-460-1500; Fax: 212-460-1700; e-mail: customerservice@springernature.com; Web site: https://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2123/
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Higher Education; Postsecondary Education; Two Year Colleges
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: California
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: 1USC Rossier School of Education, Los Angeles, USA; 2Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University, Cambridge, USA; 3University of Nevada, Las Vegas, USA; 4Independent Researcher, Manila, Philippines