5/29/09

Sam Dillon

The New York Times

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. — After Bethany Martin graduated from high school here last June, she was surprised when the local community college told her that she had to retake classes such as basic composition, for no college credit. Each remedial course costs her $350, more than a week’s pay from her job at a Chick-fil-A restaurant.

Martin blames chaotic high-school classes. But her college instructors say that even well-run high-school courses often fail to teach what students need to know in college. They say that Martin’s senior English class, for instance, focused on literature, but little on writing.

Like Martin, more than a million college freshmen across the nation must take remedial courses each year, and many drop out before getting a degree. Poorly run public schools are a part of the problem, but so is a disconnect between high schools and colleges.

“We need to better align what we expect somebody to be able to do to graduate from high school with what we expect them to do in college,” said Billie A. Unger, the dean at Martin’s school, Blue Ridge Community and Technical College, who oversees “developmental” classes, a nice word for remedial.

The White House is pressing states to get public-school and higher-education authorities working together. President Barack Obama recently set the goal of again making America the nation with the highest proportion of college graduates by 2020, which means a lot more students who start college will have to graduate.

The stimulus law Obama signed in February requires states receiving stabilization money to work to improve courses and tests so that high-school graduates can succeed in college without remedial classes.

“This is a breakthrough, the first time we’ve had federal policies try to move the public schools and the postsecondary systems closer together by demanding preparation in high school and persistence in college,” said Michael Kirst, a Stanford University professor emeritus who has studied the proliferation of remedial courses on American campuses.

More than 60 percent of students enrolling at two-year colleges and 20 percent to 30 percent at four-year colleges take remedial courses, Kirst estimated.

“Right now, high schools hand students off to colleges and declare victory,” he said. “But they don’t look at how many had to take remedial courses or never got a degree. And the colleges blame the high schools for not preparing students, but don’t work to align the courses.”