Massachusetts College and Career Readiness Summit Tools for Meeting The Challenges Aundrea Kelley, Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic Policy Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

Challenges to Achieving College Readiness and Success Goals We need to understand what readiness means Students, their families and advisors need to be aware of the pathways to success Leaders need accessible data to sharpen strategies and focus Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

What is college readiness? “The level of preparation a student needs in order to enroll and succeed—without remediation—in a credit-bearing general education course at a post-secondary institution…” (Conley, D. (2007) Toward A More Comprehensive Conception of College Readiness, Education Policy Improvement Center, epicoline.org) Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

Remedial Coursework Does Not Lead to Degree Source: National Center for Education Statistics, The Condition of Education, Many college students who need remediation, especially in reading and math, do not earn an associate’s or a bachelor’s degree. Percentage of U.S. college students not earning degree by type of remedial coursework Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

Remedial Coursework Designed to prepare students for college-level work Enrollment based upon performance on placement exams Does not count towards degree attainment Associated with increased costs, time to graduation and decreased college graduation rates Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

How do we get more students onto pathways to college readiness and success? How do we reduce the need for remediation? Provide rigorous, relevant courses and increase the proportion of students taking them. –Percentage of students from the Massachusetts public high school Class of 2006 who completed the list of MassCore courses: 79.6% - suburban vs. 46.3% - urban Increase awareness among parents, advisors and students - at an early age, no later than middle school - of the courses that students need Facilitate early assessment as a diagnostic tool, jumpstart on college placement, alignment catalyst Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

Early Assessment School – College Partnerships Accuplacer: Reading, Mathematics, Sentence Skills Computer Adaptive Can be administered at high school Immediate feedback with customizable information Early warning; student can address weaknesses Early encouragement & contact with college Dual enrollment as follow up Results helpful to alignment Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

How do we access the data we need to better focus policies and programs? School to College Database and Report Data management system - tracks performance of public school students who enroll in Massachusetts public higher ed institutions Overall state level, as well as individual reports for each high school about their graduates’ performance in public postsecondary institutions; includes data on –Enrollment –Remedial course taking –First to second year persistence Many data will be broken down by race/ethnicity, gender, subgroups (LEP, SPED, Low Income) and grade 10 MCAS performance Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

Release of Reports Winter of BHE/DOE team will generate the state report and the individualized reports for public high schools. Based on the data and on school interest, the BHE/DOE team will work with the selected high schools to use the data as a basis for developing work plans to enhance readiness, particularly on a regional basis. Massachusetts Board of Higher Education

School to College Database – future enhancements Expand the tracking system to include student data prior to high school enrollment Prepare information on student majors, college graduation rates, MassCore completion rates and trends over time. Work with the Department of Revenue to explore integrating employment data with the hopes of creating a school-to-college-to-career tracking system. Massachusetts Board of Higher Education