Policy Brief Policy Brief: Community College Math in California’s New Era of Student Access By Marisol Cuellar Mejia, Olga Rodriguez, Hans Johnson, Cesar Alesi Perez Dec 7, 2021 After AB 705 expanded access to courses needed for transfer, the rate of students passing introductory math shot up. Racial equity gaps in access have narrowed, but some students are still enrolling in courses that don’t count for transfer.
Report Math Placement in California’s Public Schools By Niu Gao, Sara Adan Nov 16, 2016 Last year, the California Legislature passed a new law—the California Mathematics Placement Act—to address widespread concern over equity in the math placement process. The law is aimed at improving the measurement of student performance in order to move more students successfully through the high school curriculum. In this context, we surveyed California’s school districts during the 2015–16 school year to examine their placement policies right before the law took effect and to identify district needs for technical assistance while implementing the new law. We found that: Districts need help in determining how to proceed. Because the law leaves many details open to local interpretation, many districts are unsure about how to handle certain key elements. Teacher recommendations are a good example. Our survey indicates that the majority of districts have relied on recommendations as an important factor in determining placement. But the law now restricts their use. Improving the law’s clarity is critical going forward. Despite uncertainties, most districts are implementing the new law. Among our respondents, 86 percent reported having a systematic math placement policy. Sixty percent said they are somewhat or very familiar with the new law. Among these districts, 51 percent said they were already in compliance and 42 percent reported revising their policies for compliance purposes. Across districts, there is a strong need for valid, reliable, and objective performance measures. This need applies both to assessing student performance and to evaluating district policies. Districts with the largest gains in student course outcomes over a 10-year period provide some insight. These districts are more likely than others to emphasize test scores, math GPA, and overall GPA when assessing student placement. They are also more likely to use end-of-year math grades to evaluate district placement policies. Districts face a number of other challenges. Districts’ concerns range from handling parental expectations, to needing evidence-based performance measures, to creating better policy alignment within and across schools. In addition, equity issues and staffing shortages present ongoing challenges for many districts. We recommend several actions for helping districts comply with the law and improve their math placement process. These include establishing evidence-based measures, refining the approach to teacher recommendations, and identifying effective placement protocols. In the longer term, districts would benefit from using student data to improve equity issues and from increased staffing, especially in rural and high-need districts.
Report Community College Math in California’s New Era of Student Access By Marisol Cuellar Mejia, Olga Rodriguez, Hans Johnson, Cesar Alesi Perez Dec 7, 2021 In fall 2019, California’s community colleges began implementing AB 705, making reforms to place thousands of students away from remedial courses and directly into the introductory courses necessary to transfer to a four-year college. In this report, we focus on math courses and the progress that colleges and students have made under the new system as of fall 2020.
blog post Upgrading High School Math Requirements By Niu Gao Feb 13, 2017 California has not updated its math graduation requirements for 30 years and now lags behind other states in ensuring students’ success.
Report Reforming Math Pathways at California’s Community Colleges By Hans Johnson, Olga Rodriguez, Marisol Cuellar Mejia, Bonnie Brooks Oct 23, 2017 The goal of developmental education (also known as remedial or basic skills education) is to help students acquire the skills they need to be successful in college courses, but its track record is poor. In fact, it is one of the largest impediments to student success in California’s community colleges. Many students do need additional work to be ready for college, particularly in math. But every year hundreds of thousands of students are deemed underprepared for college and placed into developmental courses from which relatively few emerge. Throughout the state, community colleges are revising assessment and placement procedures to ensure that students who are ready for college are not placed in developmental education. And, given the high failure rates in traditional developmental courses, colleges are also experimenting with alternative curricular approaches.
Report Does Diagnostic Math Testing Improve Student Learning? By Julian Betts, Andrew C. Zau, Youjin Hahn Oct 11, 2011 Available to all math teachers in the state, the Mathematics Diagnostic Testing Project (MDTP) offers course-specific assessments that give teachers timely feedback on their math students’ strengths and weaknesses. This report examines San Diego’s use of MDTP test results to guide the placement of students into appropriate classes or summer school. San Diego’s experiment had positive effects and could provide lessons for other districts in the state. This report was supported with funding from the Donald Bren Foundation. The California Academic Partnership Program also provided support to the authors for related research.
blog post Governor Newsom Proposes New Investments in Math and Science Teachers By Julien Lafortune, Radhika Mehlotra Jan 16, 2020 In the state budget proposal he released last week, the governor calls for new spending to address the teacher shortage in high-need subjects.
blog post Are K–12 Students Keeping Pace in Math? By Paul Warren, Julien Lafortune Oct 12, 2018 The 2018 SBAC results of California's K–12 students show modest improvements over last year. But focusing on longer-term outcomes could be more instructive.
Report Math Matters: The Links Between High School Curriculum, College Graduation, and Earnings By Julian Betts, Heather Rose Jul 1, 2001 This study examines the relationship between mathematics in high school and labor force earnings 10 years later. Using a series of statistical models to net out the true effect of curriculum, the authors control for as many other factors as the data allow: the student's demographic characteristics, measures of student motivation and ability, family background, and high school characteristics. After taking into account all of these factors, the authors find the direct relationship between curriculum and earnings remains quite strong. The analysis also shows that it is not simply the number of math courses a student takes that is important; what matters more is the extent to which students take more-demanding courses.
blog post Trends in Math Reforms at Community Colleges By Bonnie Brooks Jun 28, 2018 Beginning in 2019, California community colleges will be required to make changes to increase students' chances of completing college-level math and English within a year. Some have already started by making improvements to remedial math courses.
