Today, 22 Complete College America Alliance states and the District of Columbia answered President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama’s call to expand college opportunity for all students by committing to dramatically increase the percent of students who complete college-level gateway courses in Math and English within one academic year. These commitments come at a time when the President is revitalizing the goal he set in 2009 for the U.S. to have the highest postsecondary attainment rate in the world by 2020.
These state commitments were among over 100 others that the White House received from colleges and non-profit organizations to ensure all students, particularly low-income students, have access to and ultimately complete college.
A quick review of the commitments highlights innovative programs and models being implemented across the country for dozens, hundreds and, in some cases, thousands of students. If fulfilled, these commitments will go a long way to achieving the President’s goal, and all the participants should be commended for their efforts.
However, the commitments made by the Complete College America states clearly stand out, because they are STATE commitments that have the potential to impact hundreds of thousands of students enrolled at all of the participating states’ public institutions.
In 2009, when the President set his goal, it would have been unheard of for a state to make such a sweeping commitment to improve remedial education and increase gateway course success. First, we did not know in 2009 that gateway course success was critical to college completion. We did not understand that only a fraction of the 50% of all college students who are placed into remedial education each year make it to a college level gateway course, much less pass that course and proceed to a postsecondary credential. Second, in 2009, states and institutions had little idea how to increase success rates in gateway college courses and consequently would not have been willing to be on the record in favor of such a goal. They did not know what we know now – that placing the vast majority of students who are assessed below college ready in gateway courses and providing them academic support as a corequisite could result in dramatic increases in gateway course success at rates two, three or even four times the rate of traditional remediation.
In 2014, because of groundbreaking research and innovative corequisite models, we now know the importance of gateway course success and understand what needs to be done to achieve the commitments that DC and 22 states made today. It is because of how far we have come that we celebrate the commitments made today, but it is because of what institutions and states are already doing to increase gateway success that we are confident that these states and many others will fulfill their commitments in the days ahead.
