Submitted to the college of education and health sciences benedictine university lisle, illinois

AtD has stated that state policy reform is needed and is an integral part of the several approaches to institutional and student success at community colleges. From 2004-2012, 15 states have participated in Achieving the Dream policy change initiatives. This has led to the creation of the Postsecondary State Policy Network (PSPN), led by Jobs for the Future, a partner in AtD. The network is a multi-state collaboration for the purpose of creating and promoting state policy agendas to accelerate community college student success and completion of a degree or certificate. The Postsecondary State Policy Network (PSPN) has two primary goals, which are to help states design administrative, institutional, and legislative policies to support reform strategies and, supported by data, to coordinate with other states the emerging lessons and models in community colleges. The PSPN focuses on policies that are organized in a framework that supports students' pathways from enrollment through completion of a degree or certificate.

The PSPN conducts original research on success strategies and meaningful or significant metrics, and makes them available to educators in the community college sector. This is so that

community colleges, policy-makers, funders, and higher education researchers have meaningful data to benchmark colleges’ performance, based on student outcomes. These individuals will also be able to recognize the value of data-driven decision making and will have tools to help them analyze student outcomes at their institutions and have access to better research on institutional policies and practices that improve student outcomes. Finally, they will understand Achieving the Dream's institutional change process and its applicability to other colleges, and engage the public (AtD, 2012).

Leader Colleges

Achieving the Dream selects colleges based on their commitment to closing achievement gaps and improving student success based on a culture of evidence on their campuses. Sustained improvement in student outcomes over a period of three years allows an institution to earn the Achieving the Dream Leader College designation. The AtD website ascribes the following benefits to their leader colleges:

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  "Priority opportunity for competitive grants through the Achieving the Dream Grant Program.
  
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  Recognition as sources of expert advice for national and regional events.
  
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  Features in Achieving the Dream promotional and technical assistance materials.
  
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  Branding as a national exemplar through the right to display the Leader College logo on your college's website and in communications materials.
  
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  Opportunity to serve as mentors within the Achieving the Dream National Reform Network and advocate for the principles of Achieving the Dream" (AtD, 2012).
  

There have been 167 participating community colleges, of which 66 are leader colleges. The institution where this study was conducted became a participating college in 2005 and a leader college in 2009.

Created in 2001 as a project of the Community College Leadership Program at the University of Texas at Austin, the CCSSE works in partnership with the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), an organization which concentrates on four-year colleges and universities. The NSSE had been established in 1998 and its main offices are in the Center for Postsecondary Research and Planning at Indiana University. The NSSE survey began in the midst of concerns about the lack of emphasis on student learning in major colleges and universities in the United States. In the light of a noticeable lack of attention to two-year institutions, the CCSSE began in 2001, with the purpose of gathering data about community college quality and performance, in order to provide institutions and policymakers with information to assist in creating strategies to improve student learning and retention.

State governing boards, federal U.S. Department of Education regulations, and regional and professional accreditation organizations increasingly expect community colleges to assess quality, performance, and accountability, and to maintain transparency before the public in terms of their performance. The CCSSE survey has questions pertaining to the assessment of institutional practices and student behaviors, which "correlate highly with student learning and retention" (CCSSE, 2012, para. 4). A research -based tool, it is a benchmarking instrument establishing institutional and national norms on educational practice and performance; a diagnostic tool to identify areas to enhance students' educational experiences; and a monitoring device to document institutional practices and student behaviors in order to improve institutional effectiveness over a period of time.

The CCSSE publicly reports its survey results, creating a catalyst for open discussion of quality and performance at community colleges in general, or any specific community college. This is an environment of public accountability on which community colleges use to improve institutional practices. The survey can be used to establish national and consortium benchmarks to assist community colleges in comparing their own performance with other colleges. States and community colleges have already selected CCSSE as part of institutional and statewide performance, quality improvement, and accountability systems. Regional accrediting associations have also begun to promote the survey as a part of institutional self-analysis for quality performance measures.

The League for Innovation in the Community College was established in 1968 as an organization to assist community college leaders in enhancing student learning in their respective colleges. In 2003, the League created the National Community College Benchmarking project, utilizing student performance benchmarks including completion rates, transfer-student performance, and persistence rates for eleven community colleges. The student-learning outcomes benchmarks included the proportion of students who met educational goals, retention and success rates for developmental students in college level courses, as well as retention and success rates in four academic skills. Also incorporated were institutional grade distributions keeping in mind withdrawal rates and institutional grade distributions in online-learning courses. Benchmarks for student satisfaction and engagement were established using the Noel-Levitz Student Satisfaction Survey, the ACT Student Opinion Survey, and the CCSSE survey (Junke, 2006). These benchmarks served as effectiveness measures and also served as the framework on which Achieving the Dream was created.

Traditionally, community colleges have been teaching-centered, meaning that knowledge was transmitted from the professor to the student. Students would passively receive information (or not) and teaching and assessment were separate. Under the teaching-centered model, assessment of the student's work was given toward the end of the semester. While grades were given on students' work, no real communication existed for ways in which the students could improve their work. Although a review of exam results sometimes sparked student feedback to the professor, there was not necessarily individual feedback from the professor to the student. Learning was assessed indirectly, by test scores only. Focus was on a single discipline, without the recognition of an interdisciplinary approach. The culture was competitive, and therefore individualistic. Students found out where they stood academically among peers. Students were the only population in the academic community viewed as learners (Huba & Freed, 2000).

Many colleges began to switch to being institutions of student-centered learning (SCL). This pedagogical methodology took into account the individual student's needs, abilities, interests, and learning styles. In many cases, this required the introduction of technology into the classroom, or in the college, for the student to learn classroom material at their own pace (Jonassen, D. & Land, S., 2000).

Learning Centered Paradigm

In the early 1990s, community colleges began to supplement or change their pedagogical methodology to learning-centered values, and added this philosophy to their mission statements.

Robert B. Barr and John Tagg first proposed the learning-centered paradigm in 1995 as a solution to the gaps in student learning that existed in the teacher-centered paradigm. In the learning-centered paradigm, rather than students just receiving information from the professor, students construct knowledge by receiving the information and integrating it with skills of inquiry, communication, critical thinking, problem solving, and study group involvement. Students are actively involved, rather than passive receivers of information. The knowledge gained and assessed is used in inquiry on real-life emerging issues and problems. The professor becomes a coach and a facilitator of the process. Professors and students evaluate learning together and the professor communicates the progress to the student on a progressive basis, through the semester, engaging teaching and assessment simultaneously. From this perspective, assessment then promotes rather than just monitors learning. The emphasis in learning becomes learning from errors. Desired learning is assessed through papers, projects, performances, and portfolios, rather than just by standardized exams. The approach to learning is interdisciplinary. Study groups and class inquiry enable the culture of the learning environment to be cooperative, collaborative, and supportive. Further, professors and students learn together.

The Learning College Project

In a 1997 survey administered by the League for Innovation in the Community College, over 500 community college presidents (97%) responded positively and affirmed that their institutions would move forward to becoming a learning-centered institution in the next three to five years. By January 2000, the League received a grant to fund what was called the Learning College Project, designed to gain intercollegiate cooperation, to assist community colleges in fulfilling the goal of becoming learning-centered institutions. Internationally, 94 applications were received from the United States and Canada. An international team of international community college scholars was established to review the applications and 12 colleges were selected among the applicants to be the catalysts for change in the Learning College Project and were called Vanguard Learning Colleges. These 12 Vanguard Colleges were to be committed to the Learning College concept, in which the results would serve as a model for best practices in community colleges.

The Vanguard Colleges

The Vanguard colleges chosen for the Learning College Project were:

Cascadia Community College (Bothell, WA)

The Community College of Denver (Denver, CO)

Kirkwood Community College (Cedar Rapids, IA)

Madison Area Technical College (Madison, WI)

Moraine Valley Community College (Palos Hills, IL)

Sinclair Community College (Dayton, OH)

The Community College of Baltimore County (Baltimore, MD)

Humber College (Toronto, Ontario, Canada)

Lane Community College (Eugene, OR)

Palomar Community College (San Marcos, CA)

Richland College (Dallas, TX)

Valencia Community College (Orlando, FL)

The Vanguard Learning College Project selected community colleges with diverse characteristics. There were large and small colleges, urban and suburban colleges, those with emphases on vocational programs, transfer options, and significant minority populations, as well as those that had low minority populations. Taking the lead from former President and CEO of the League for Innovation in the Community College, Dr. Terry O'Banion (1997), the Vanguard Learning College Project adopted five objectives in January 2000:

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  Learning Outcomes - each of the colleges will agree on competencies on a core program of the college's choice, on strategies to improve learning outcomes, on assessment processes to measure these outcomes, and on means to documenting achievements.
  
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  Technology - information technology (IT) will primarily be used to improve and expand student learning.
  
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  Staff recruitment and development - recruitment and hiring programs will focus on training new staff and faculty to be learning-centered.
  
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  Student Engagement - Students will be engaged in the learning process as well in the institutional educational culture.
  
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  Organizational Culture - policies, programs, practices, and personnel that support learning will be the major priority.
  

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  Underprepared students - each of the colleges will create or expand learning-centered programs or strategies to ensure the success of underprepared students.
  

This study focuses on student success at College X. Student success is defined differently by each institution. Most institutions include student engagement, student persistence in the first year, and academic performance as key indicators of student success (Kuh, Kinzie, Buckley, Bridges, & Hayek, 2006).

A study involving 13 participating community colleges done by Jobs for the Future and the Delta Cost Project released a 2010 report on cost return for student success initiatives tying program-level cost data to student outcomes in a community college's success programs. The report stressed a "strategic and measured approach to improving student success," largely due to success initiatives being tied to federal and state funds (HEI, 2010 para. 1). It was recommended that institutions develop two to three student outcomes and to focus on them. Once student outcomes are identified, to facilitate these outcomes, the following suggestions were made:

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  Online academic planning tools
  
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  Financial literacy tools
  
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  Career planning tools
  
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  A job placement search and job portfolio
  
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  An academic and career-planning component in a student success course.
  

Both, the League for Innovation in the Community College and Achieving the Dream, advise that student success has been linked to technology, in particular, instructional technology. Those students who used information technology in classrooms were found more likely to have faculty-student contact, and emphasized applying theory or concepts to practical problems in new situations (Nelson, Laird, & Kuh, 2005). These students were also more frequent in participating in groups outside of class, thus experiencing increased engagement to the academic and social life of the campus. The use of instructional software and web-based learning helped to improve course completion rates and lower drop or failure rates (Twigg, 2003). Classroom technology has led to higher achievement scores and increased student success. Academic material posted online helped students to access instructional information at any time on any day. This increased access helped to bolster information missed in lectures or classes. Group or team discussions online, whether through email, Skype, or video, assisted students in exchanging information learned in class to prepare for examinations. Online tutorials, continuous assessment and feedback, online access to learning centers, and early interventions are other advantages and help engage the student, increase academic performance, facilitate persistence in college, and increase student success (Twigg, 2005). However, technology is one of many strategies in Achieving the Dream. Achieving the Dream's overall strategy for student success is structuring a learning-centered institution that has a culture of evidence in which to measure that success. Though test scores, grade point averages, student satisfaction surveys, and conferences to train institutional faculty and staff are included in the goal of student success, benchmarks measure that success. Institutional Benchmarks in the AtD initiative are identified like goals. Examples would be achieving a 10% reduction in gatekeeper courses by 2011, and a 20% reduction by 2012. Another example is an increase in the retention rate by 2% in 2011, or 4% by 2012. Another example would be the fact that completion and graduation rates (such as in certificate and associate degree programs) increased by 1% in 2011, but 3% by 2012.

At the institution where this study was conducted, specific strategies implemented through Achieving the Dream's student success initiative included:

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  The design of a mandatory orientation process which was offered onsite and online.
  
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  The increased role of technology in engaging students at the college.
  
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  The reorganization of the developmental reading and mathematics curriculum and the requirement of mandatory completion of these courses before moving to college-level courses.
  
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  Training of faculty and staff in becoming learning-centered as well as in addressing the individual needs of the students.
  
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  The creation and implementation of learning communities in the college and tracking their success.
  
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  Establishing and maintaining a culture of evidence.
  

One of Achieving the Dream's strategies for improving student success is a freshman orientation program, combined with student advising services, counseling, and mentor programs. The purpose of orientation was to familiarize the student to the institution and its programs and to teach academic survival skills. First semester freshmen seminars, also referred to as freshman student orientation, were programs found to be effective. The seminars were even more effective when it was a regular class with an assigned instructor (Pascarella & Terenzini, 1991). Muraskin and Wilner (2004) concluded that freshman orientation programs were effective, but were voluntary, limiting the success of the program to those students that attended. Pascarella and Terenzini also concluded that freshman seminars while being effective, are voluntary, thus inhibiting their level of effectiveness (1991).

First year seminars or orientation programs have been consistent with higher education institutions for several decades, in an effort to transition students into the new higher education culture and address high rates of student attrition (Hunter & Linder, 2005). Through the Achieving the Dream initiative, since 2011, many community colleges are now adopting a mandatory freshman student orientation program that consists of teaching students how to write and take notes, take tests, and manage their time (Millikin, 2011). Some institutions call the orientation program a college success course and also instruct and advise students on study skills, goal setting, and accessing campus facilities and support services (Moore & Shulock, 2009). Studies done in community colleges provide evidence that freshman students taking orientation upon enrollment complete courses at higher percentages, earn more total credit hours, have higher GPAs, and have higher persistence and graduation rates (Derby & Smith, 2004; Glass & Garrett, 1995; Scrivener, Sommo, & Collado, 2009; Stovall, 1999; Zimmerman, 2000).

Developmental Education Restructuring

Developmental education is designed to provide students with weak academic skills or learning disabilities an opportunity to strengthen or improve on those skills enough to attain the ability to perform well in college level course work (Bailey, Jeong, & Cho, 2010). The term developmental education is used interchangeably with remedial education. They are the same concept, but higher education institutions may vary on how they define developmental education. Some institutions have not agreed on what is "college ready," what kinds of assessment are used, placement, teaching methodologies or pedagogy, staffing, when developmental education is completed, and when these students are ready for college-level work. Credit-bearing courses are different from state to state and institution to institution (Bailey, et al., 2010). Historically, there was no actual centralized strategy to deal with this issue.

The focus on developmental education has gone from developmental courses to developmental sequence. Placement tests guide the institution on what courses to place the student in upon initial enrollment. Students with the greatest need in Mathematics are placed in developmental courses in math and are expected to pass these courses before proceeding to college-level math courses. The first focus is on the first course, which the student must pass to proceed. It then proceeds to the next level or course of developmental math, until all developmental courses are successfully completed. The focus then is on the first college-level course, also called the gatekeeper course, due to the fact that the developmental education program was designed to prepare the student for that first college-level course (Bailey, et al., 2010).

In the Virginia community college system, a 2004 study on developmental education gatekeeper courses and developmental education students found that among students who were recommended into remedial or developmental courses in Mathematics, many did not enroll in them. Instead, many enrolled in the gatekeeper course(s) with many of the higher scoring students (Jenkins, Smith Jaggars & Roksa, 2009). Thirty-nine percent of students directed to developmental math courses did not take them. Similarly, 35% of students advised to take developmental writing and 41% of those advised to take developmental reading did not enroll in these courses (Jenkins et al., 2009). This displayed low student compliance to the developmental education programs.

Among developmental students, those who began at the lowest level of developmental courses were less likely to take gatekeeper courses than those who began at the highest level of developmental course work or those who did not take developmental courses at all. Only 19% of those at the lowest level of developmental math made it to the gatekeeper course. It was recommended that colleges should investigate why students who are recommended to developmental education college courses do not follow placement recommendations, consider alternative enrollment procedures and policies for students in the lowest level of developmental courses, develop policies to motivate students in developmental programs toward gatekeeper courses and develop policies to motivate those originally placed in gatekeeper courses to take those courses first.

In the National Postsecondary Student Aid Study from 2003-2004, 43% of students in community colleges took at least one remedial course (Bailey et al., 2009). Further, longitudinal studies showed even higher rates where 58% of community college students took at least one remedial course, 44% up to three courses, and 14% took more than three courses (Attewell, Lavin, Domina, & Levey (2006). However, when using the Achieving the Dream colleges, at least 59% enrolled in at least one developmental course (Bailey et al., 2009).