This blog focuses on my scholarship in my five research projects: learning assistance and equity programs, student peer study group programs, learning technologies, Universal Design for Learning, and history simulations. And occasional observations about life.
Transforming Remediation: Understanding the Research, Policy, and Practice (Webinar)
Transforming Remediation: Understanding the Research, Policy, and Practice was a webinar conducted October 4, 2013 highlights research into the problems of remediation, along with promising practices from community colleges across the country. Speakers include Complete College America’s Bruce Vandal, the California Acceleration Project’s Katie Hern, North Carolina’s Cynthia Lyston, and researcher Michelle Hodara. The webinar was co-sponsored by the American Youth Policy Forum and the American Institutes for Research. Through the California Acceleration Project, the state is seeking alternatives to traditinoal approaches of developmental-level courses for meeting the needs of the students and the state.
MOOCs Don't Work for Academically Underprepared Students by Udacity Founder
Much has been written about MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) as an important advance for making college accessible and inexpensive for students worldwide. Frankly, I have never seen an instructional technology drawn such high visibility from popular and professional media, embraced so quickly, and universal claims made about its efficacy, with little to no evidence. As a technology geek, I would be happy to read of MOOC success with students. But the walls are being to crack in this success story. The following report published in the Chronicle of Higher Education (based on interview through another publication), reveals that even one of the founders of the MOOC movement admitting that MOOCs may not work for academically underprepared students. MOOCs may favor the better prepared and also the more affluent. Does this mean that MOOCs would not be effective with TRiO students? No, there are many TRiO students that may be low-income or first-generation for college that might benefit from MOOCs. But for those that are academically underprepared, caustion is warranted. Watch for more reports on the efficacy of MOOCs. carefully read the reports to see for whom the MOOCs are effective. Time will tell.
The Chronicle of Higher Education: Sebastian Thrun, the Udacity founder calls his company’s massive open online courses a “lousy product” to use for educating underprepared college students. Mr. Thrun reflected on the discouraging results of an experiment at San Jose State University in which instructors used Udacity’s online platform to teach mathematics. Some of the students were enrolled at the university, and some at a local high school. “We were on the front pages of newspapers and magazines, and at the same time, I was realizing, we don’t educate people as others wished, or as I wished. We have a lousy product,” Mr. Thrun told the reporter, Max Chafkin. “It was a painful moment.”
But academics who have studied online education for longer than a few years were not surprised by the Udacity founder’s humbling. “Well, there it is folks,” wrote George Siemens, a researcher and strategist at Athabasca University’s Technology Enhanced Knowledge Research Institute, on his blog. “After two years of hype, breathless proclamations about how Udacity will transform higher education, Silicon Valley blindness to existing learning research, and numerous articles/interviews featuring Sebastian Thrun, Udacity has failed.” “Thrun seems to have ‘discovered’ that open-access, distance-education students struggle to complete,” wrote Martin Weller, a professor of educational technology at the Open University, in Britain. “I don’t want to sound churlish here, but hey, the OU has known this for 40 years.”
Beyond schadenfreude, Mr. Thrun’s humbling has left some academics wondering who MOOCs are good for, if not underprivileged students in California. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania recently noted that the students taking MOOCs from Penn on Coursera, another major MOOC platform, tend to be well educated already. “The individuals the MOOC revolution is supposed to help the most—those without access to higher education in developing countries—are underrepresented among the early adopters,” wrote the researchers.
In a blog post this week, Mr. Thrun responded to the fallout from the Fast Company profile by citing data from Udacity’s summer pilot with San Jose State, whose pass rates compared more favorably to the traditional versions offered on the campus. But he neglected to mention that Udacity had, by then, stopped focusing on underprivileged students. More than half of the students in the summer trial already had a college degree. “Thrun’s cavalier disregard for the SJSU students reveals his true vision of the target audience for MOOCs: students from the posh suburbs, with 10 tablets apiece and no challenges whatsoever—that is, the exact people who already have access to expensive higher education,” wrote Rebecca Schuman, a Slate columnist and adjunct professor at the University of Missouri at St. Louis.
Advanced Placement Courses and Historically-Underrepresented College Students
From the New York Times. ORLANDO, Fla. — Every year, more than 600,000 academically promising high school students — most of them poor, Latino or black — fail to enroll in Advanced Placement courses, often viewed as head starts for the college-bound.
Some of them do not know about these courses, which offer an accelerated curriculum and can lead to college credit. Others assume they will be too difficult. But many are held back by entrenched perceptions among administrators and teachers, whose referrals are often required for enrollment, about who belongs in what has long served as an elite preserve within public schools.
“Many teachers don’t truly believe that these programs are for all kids or that students of color or low-income kids can succeed in these classes,” said Christina Theokas, director of research at the Education Trust, a nonprofit group. Ms. Theokas said that if those underrepresented students had taken A.P. courses at the same rate as their white and more affluent peers in 2010, there would have been about 614,500 more students in those classes.
In an effort to overcome those obstacles, an increasing number of school districts, including Boston, Cincinnati and Washington, have recently begun initiatives to expand Advanced Placement course offerings and enroll more black and Hispanic students, children from low-income families and those who aspire to be the first in their generation to go to college. In the spring, lawmakers in Washington State passed legislation encouraging all districts to enroll in advanced courses any student who meets a minimum threshold on state standardized tests or the Preliminary SAT exam.
While some critics say A.P. classes are little more than another round of test prep, supporters say they can foster a culture of learning. Humberto Fuentes, a senior here at Freedom High School taking his first A.P. classes, in English literature and economics, said they were the first time he had been around peers who enjoyed school.
“In regular classes, people are trying to distract you with music videos or saying, ‘Hey, look at this cat playing a piano’ on their phones,” said Humberto, 17, who emigrated with his parents from Ecuador when he was an infant and hopes to be the first in his family to attend college. “Whereas in an A.P. class, they will show you something from the text and say, ‘Hey, this is fun.’ ”
<Click on this link to read the rest of the article from the New York Times.>
Strategies to Support Success of Former Veterans in College, Report 2011
The National Science Foundation provited grants to increase sucess of returning veterans with enrolling in and completing baccalaureate and graduate engineering programs. They conducted a detailed evaluation of the grants to identity best practices. The report was completed by Penn State University. <Click on this link for the entire report.>
Based on the researchers review of the professional literature, the following criteria emerged as being highly supportive of the veterans. It was not expected that any institution would have all the following, but a critical mass was necessary for creating a supportive environment and warranting a field review of their programs. The entire report provides the detailed field reports on the institutions and illustrated how they met these criteria.
- The presence of a veteran’s office and/or on campus veterans counselors and services. Services provided by such an office might include:
- assistance with university and Veteran Affairs paperwork
- programs to assist students called up to active duty
- orientation programs or programs for veterans helping them adjust to college life
- participation in the American Council on Education/National Association of Student Personnel Administrators program for disabled vets
- an active veterans support group
- service available to assist veteran students with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI)
- active lobbying efforts to improve institutional services and/or state and federal veteran support
- other programs available to veterans and families
- Explicit institutional focus on student veterans in the form of task forces or committees to address their needs and issues
- College credit for military training and experience
- College credit for standardized tests (CLEP and DANTES)
- Faculty awareness of veterans in the classroom
- Access to tutoring services and refresher courses
- Easily navigable and executable procedures for students called to active duty who must exit/re-enter the institution
- Accessible disability and counseling services
- Flexible academic options, such as:
- Online course offerings
- Weekend, evening, or early morning classes
- Participation in the Yellow Ribbon Program
- (institutional grant aid to close the gap between tuition costs and GI Bill benefits)
- Veteran-knowledgeable staff in other institutional offices
- Institutional provision of transition assistance or orientation specific to veterans
- Presence of a veterans’ student group
- Application fee waivers for veterans
- An on-campus military presence (e.g., ROTC)
- Status as a Servicemembers Opportunity College
Apple's 94% Dominance in the Education Market
I was reading an online article, "Educators Weigh iPad's Dominance of Tablet Market" in Education Week. From the article: "From Los Angeles to Illinois to Maine—where Apple products far outpaced Hewlett-Packard in districts’ choices through the state’s bulk-purchasing program earlier this year— iPads are hot. In fact, they command nearly 94 percent of the tablet market in K-12 schools, according to Tom Mainelli, the research director focusing on the tablet market for IDC Research, a San Mateo, Calif.-based firm that provides market analysis of technology. By the end of this calendar year, total shipments for tablet computing devices in the U.S. education marketplace are expected to exceed 3.5 million units—a 46 percent increase over 2012, indicated Mr. Mainelli, who explained that the research is proprietary and declined to name the runners-up in the tablet race. The figure covers tablets in higher education and K-12, but colleges and universities account for a much smaller proportion because, at that level, most are personal devices."
Our College of Education and Human Development at the University of Minnesota issues an iPad to all incoming students. As a faculty member in the college, we have integrated use of the iPads into all our first-year courses. I bought an iPad for personal use about a week after the first ones were available for sale. Why do I prefer the iPad, even at its expense? Like the old saying, I think you get what you pay for. I wanted a slate computer that did it all and had the largest number of apps. When I think about how much money I spend throughout the year, paying a premium for the iPad seems insignificant. I am not a snob. Most of the clothes I buy come from WalMart and JC Penny. I buy my jeans at Goodwill (jeans never wear out and the price is pennies on the dollar). I drive a 1997 Ford Explorer with some dings and dents in it. But I want the best technology. I am a value shopper, not a low cost shopper for technology (everything else falls into the low cost category). Anyway, that my story why Apple products are my choice. Plus, I think Google is evil.
Challenges of First Generation College Students
From Stateline, "Encouraging first-generation college students by Adrienne Lu, Staff Writer. As a senior at Taft High School in Lincoln City, Oregon, last year, Skyler Lopez didn’t spend much time thinking about his future. Skyler’s identical twin Tyler had been aiming for Western Oregon University since the eighth grade—a daunting goal, since nobody in the Lopez family had ever graduated from college. But Skyler struggled in high school and had to scramble to even graduate. For him, college seemed like a stretch. “A lot of it was laziness, a lot of it was worrying about the financial issues,” Skyler said.
Creating a College Culture
The initiative encourages students whose parents are low-income or who didn’t go to college to apply to at least one college or university. Started in 2005, it is funded by philanthropic foundations and coordinated by the American Council on Education, which represents the presidents of U.S. colleges and universities. High schools can customize their college application weeks to meet students’ needs, but all of them schedule time during school hours for seniors to submit applications, often aided by volunteers trained to answer questions.
Schools try to drum up publicity and enthusiasm by holding raffles for students who submit applications, handing out “I applied” stickers and urging teachers to decorate their doors with photos and pennants showing their own alma maters. The Oregon University System created a YouTube video featuring people’s responses when they asked them to explain—in five words or less—why students should apply to college. “It’s all about creating a college-going culture in our communities,” said Kate Derrick, a spokeswoman for the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, which coordinates the college application weeks in that state. “For us, it means for our students, it’s not a matter of if they’ll go to college, but where and recognizing that here in Tennessee, the jobs of the future will require college degrees.”
The American College Application Campaign began at a single high school in Siler City, N.C., and has since spread across the country. This year, about 2,000 schools in 39 states and the District of Columbia are participating. National College Application Week is Nov. 11-15 this year, but many schools hold their events earlier so students can take advantage of early action and scholarship deadlines. Many states have jumped in to help. In some, state employees coordinate the application drives, and some governors have signed proclamations to promote college application weeks.
The Burden of Being First
Bobby Kanoy, who directs the expansion of the campaign to new states, said that research shows the nation’s economy needs more college graduates. The percentage of 25- to 29-year-olds with at least a bachelor’s degree grew from 23 percent in 1990 to 33 percent in 2012, according to the U.S. Department of Education. Even so, the U.S. isn’t producing enough graduates with the skills to thrive in the country’s evolving economy. “Unless we increase the number of students coming through the pipeline, we’re going to come up short,” of workers who are educated enough for the jobs of the future, Kanoy said. “If we come up short of people who can do these jobs… we either have to send the jobs offshore, or we have to import the talent. Matt Rubinoff, executive director of I’m First, an initiative of the Center for Student Opportunity, a nonprofit aimed at supporting first-generation college students, said that while low-income students in middle school aspire to go to college at the same rate as their higher-income peers, they don’t matriculate at nearly the same rate.
Research indicates that a parent’s education is the greatest predictor of how well a student does in school and the level of education he or she achieves. Once enrolled, first-generation college students are four times more likely to drop out than peers whose parents have college degrees, Rubinoff said. “Because of a lack of familial support and support in schools and in their communities, low-income first-generation students generally lack good information and support to navigate the college application process and the colleges that are most committed to their success,” Rubinoff said. While the college application is only one step among many for low-income and first-generation college students, experts say it is a critical hurdle. “Studies show that if students do apply, they have a high likelihood of enrolling,” said Margaret Cahalan, acting director of the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education.
The barriers for first-generation college students may be big or small, real or perceived. Several high school counselors involved with the American College Application Campaign say that while most students have the desire to go to college, many first-generation students worry about not working to help support their families or fear taking on student loan debt, particularly in an uncertain job market. Others, lacking the support of someone at home who has been through the college application process themselves, may be deterred by something as seemingly insignificant as not knowing what to put down for “permanent address” on an application form, or by an inability to pay application fees, which are often waived by colleges for low-income students.
Scared to Apply
At Ottawa Hills High School in Grand Rapids, Mich., college adviser Gabe Pena, who was the first in his family to graduate from college, said that some students are drawn to work at one of the assembly-line jobs in southeast Grand Rapids, which beckon students with wages of $10 an hour. Other students avoid applications because they think they will have to fill out a lengthy application and write an essay, which is generally not true of community colleges. Pena said many students are excited to learn that the state offers a scholarship for many low-income students to attend community colleges. “The majority of kids want to go to college,” Pena said. “There’s this grand idea of college – it seems like something unattainable, but they want to get there. I help familiarize them with all the options.”
Laura Klinger, a college adviser at two high schools in rural St. Claire County, Mich., said that filling out a college application is often the easiest part of applying to college. But going through that process and receiving a notice of acceptance can boost a student’s confidence, she said, and motivate them to continue through the red tape of orientations, housing deposits and financial aid forms. “I think the value of having an adviser in the school is to try and help them with that process,” Klinger said. Skyler said some of the students from his high school who don’t go to college get involved with “bad stuff” like drinking, drugs and partying. “I probably would have lived at home,” he said, reflecting on how different his life might be today. “I probably wouldn’t have gone (to college) and a lot of things would be a lot different.”
Why Are More Women that Men Going to College?
From Education Week, A Closer Look at Why More Women Than Men Are Going to College By Caralee Adams on October 31, 2013
A new study traces the growing gender gap in college enrollment to choices girls and boys make about which high school to attend. The research findings, published in a recent issue of the journal Educational Researcher, look at the high school and college-enrollment patterns of 537,000 students in Florida public high schools from 2002 to 2006. Overall, 65 percent of high school graduates in Florida immediately went on to a 2-year or 4-year college, but 70 percent of females enrolled and just 59 percent of males—more than a 10 percent gap.
The authors, Dylan Conger, associate professor of public policy at George Washingon University, and Mark Long, associate professor of public affairs and economics at the University of Washington, analyzed why these gender gaps exist and examined where students attended high school. In Florida, parents and students often have school choice at the secondary level and the study discovered different enrollment patterns by gender, particularly among minorities. The evidence of gender sorting across high schools was beyond what would occur if students were randomly assigned to schools.
Boys in the analysis were more likely to attend high schools that appear to disadvantage them—schools that have a lower college-going rate. Girls may be sorting into more academically challenging schools, suggest Conger and Long, but they are not definitive about whether the schools are producing the gender gaps.
Differences in the high schools attended by males and females explain about 11 percent of the female college-going advantage over males. But the high school effects explained larger portions of the gender gaps in college entry for minority students. The study found across-school gender sorting explained 12 percent of Hispanic female's higher college-going rates and 16 percent of black female students' higher rates of enrollment.
The researchers said they were unable to determine why boys and girls select into these different types of schools. But the findings have implications for policymakers in the future, particularly with the rise in same-sex school environments. The authors' previous research found that counties where a larger share of students attend private, magnet, charter, and irregular public schools have higher levels of gender-sorting across schools. This issue merits further attention, the study notes, as the National Center for Education Statistics projects enrollment for women will increase by 21 percent by 2019, but only 12 percent for men