PRESS RELEASE
Contact: Sarah Hersh-Walker, 510-759-2921, sarah@fcpcommunications.com
Report: CA Community Colleges Must Address Uneven, Inequitable Remediation Reform
Research shows huge promise of legislation overhauling English and math remediation but many students are left out, especially Black and Latinx students
Oakland, CA — Today, the California Acceleration Project and Public Advocates released a new report on the state of remediation reform in California’s community colleges. The report looks at the second year of implementation of Assembly Bill 705, a 2017 law that overhauled practices that were derailing students from their educational goals.
The report highlights the significant progress the state’s community colleges have made implementing AB 705 reforms, including doubling student completion of transferable, college-level math and English in the first year of full implementation. But it points to the need for further changes to ensure that uneven implementation does not continue to drive inequitable outcomes for Black and Latinx students.
“The first year of AB 705 implementation showed that students are much more capable than colleges had previously believed,” said Katie Hern, Co-Founder of the California Acceleration Project and Professor of English at Skyline College. “But too many colleges are still underestimating students and clinging to old remedial courses, especially in math. It is within colleges’ power to transform student outcomes if we implement AB 705 with fidelity.”
The key findings in the new report from California Acceleration Project and Public Advocates – titled “Still Getting There” – include the following:
-
- California made substantial initial progress in transforming placement and remediation in the first year of implementation (Fall 2019). Student completion is approximately 30 percentage points higher at colleges that have replaced remedial courses with corequisite support in transfer-level classes.
- In the second year of implementation (Fall 2020), progress has slowed and some colleges have even backtracked by increasing remedial offerings. Research has established that remedial courses reduce student completion for every demographic group studied to date, but at 69 colleges, remedial classes still make up over 20% of introductory math sections offered. Out of California’s 116 community colleges, only 3 have achieved 100% implementation of AB 705 changes in both English and math.
- There are significant racial inequities in the implementation of the law. Black and Latinx students disproportionately attend colleges that have maintained large remedial math offerings. Colleges serving over 2,000 Black students are more than twice as likely to be weak implementers of AB 705 as other colleges.
AB 705 requires colleges to use students’ high school grades for placement, places restrictions on requiring students to enroll in remedial courses, and steers colleges to replace remedial courses with corequisite models in which students receive additional support while enrolled in a transferable, college-level class. Under the law, colleges must place students into courses that “maximize the probability that a student will enter and complete transfer-level coursework in English and mathematics within a one-year time frame.”
“This is a civil rights issue,” said Karina Paredes, Student Engagement & Policy Associate with Public Advocates. “Colleges are exacerbating long entrenched systemic inequities for students of color — specifically Black students, by offering substantial remedial math classes that undermine the likelihood of students achieving their transfer and graduation goals.”
The report recommends that students file a complaint with their college and the state Chancellor’s office for non-compliance with AB 705 if their college is not offering sufficient access to transfer-level math. Looking to the future, the report also offers a strong recommendation that stakeholders work together to fully replace remedial courses with corequisite models across the California community college system by Fall 2022.
“I was afraid of math before I enrolled in statistics with corequisite support at Cuyamaca College,” said Mariam Shamon, a community college student who successfully transfered to San Diego State University and is on track to graduate with a civil engineering degree. “But the support helped a lot. I got an A and began considering a career that I never thought of before. This experience made me realize that I can do almost anything.”
Click here to see the report.
# # #
About the California Acceleration Project (CAP)
The California Acceleration Project is a faculty-led professional development network that supports the state’s 116 community colleges to implement reforms that reduce racial inequities and substantially increase student completion of transferable, college-level English and math requirements, a critical milestone on the path to degrees and transfer.
About Public Advocates
Public Advocates is a nonprofit civil rights law firm and advocacy organization that challenges the systemic causes of poverty and discrimination. For nearly fifty years it has strengthened community voices in public policy and achieved tangible legal victories advancing education, housing, transportation, and climate justice.
