Making “College Ready” Matter

Imagine a group
of high school seniors in cap and gown being congratulated for completing their
state’s requirements to earn a high school diploma. Are they ready for college
or a career? In some states, that depends on who you ask. Depending on where
the student lives, a high school test score or fulfilled state curricular
requirements may not be enough to convince colleges they’re ready to enroll.
Colleges, high schools, and employers all have a stake in students graduating
high school ready for college, but lack of a shared definition of readiness can
complicate policy making and create barriers for students.

At a recent
event at New America, Delaware Governor Jack Markell spoke about college
readiness and Jobs for the Future’s Joel Vargas and Community College Research Center’s Elisabeth Barnett addressed the question of alignment of
college readiness assessment in American high schools and colleges. The event
also served as an introduction to Atlas, a new online mapping tool developed by New America’s
Education Policy Program and presented by policy analyst Lindsey Tepe. Atlas
visually depicts how college readiness is defined, assessed, and used across
the country using publicly available data verified where possible by states’
Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Flexibility Requests. 

As it
stands, only thirteen states have college course placement policies that are
aligned with high school test results, meaning students’ scores from one
assessment signal both college-readiness to their high schools and their
colleges. Seven states have partially aligned course placement policies, which
could mean that state colleges require students to take a course placement exam
that differs from required high school exams designed to assess college
readiness, unless they’ve achieved a certain score on the required assessment
taken in high school. 

Twenty-three states simply have no college course placement
policy at all, and eight states have placement policies that are not aligned
with high school assessment, which could mean that the state requires no
college-readiness assessment in high school but does require students to submit
satisfactory college-readiness assessment scores to be placed into
college-level classes. Quite literally all over the map at this point,
disparate policies within and across states are affecting students’ access to
college and college-level coursework upon completion of high school.

Disjointed
standards based on different ideas of college readiness could lead to some
newly-minted high school graduates ending up with a crisp, new diploma in one
hand and apologetic rejection letters or lists of extra course requirements
from colleges in their state in the other, an eventuality that Delaware, for
one, is working to prevent. In his remarks, Governor Markell described his
state’s efforts to use the Common Core-aligned Smarter Balanced math and
English language arts test to assess students’ college readiness in 11th grade.
Those scores are then used by colleges for course placement. A high enough
Smarter Balanced score means that a student won’t be required to take costly
and time-consuming remedial classes in college. 

For students who don’t meet the
Smarter Balanced test’s readiness standards, the assessment provides good
indicators for where improvements can be made, as Elisabeth Barnett pointed out
in her comments during the discussion. Knowing where they stand in
11th grade gives students the opportunity to pursue other means of
demonstrating readiness while still in high school. High schools may
offer students opportunities like “transition
courses” in 12th grade or other classes specifically designed with preparation
for college-level work in mind. A passing grade in a transition class
guarantees placement into college-level coursework, just as a high enough
Smarter Balanced score would do. With multiple chances to develop and prove their
college readiness, students are better positioned for success when they head to
campus after high school.

However, the use of state
assessments can also create unique challenges for school systems. In the case
of the Smarter Balanced test, using Common Core-aligned readiness assessments
in 11th grade leaves educators responsible for figuring out the best ways to maximize
students’ senior year. 

For Joel Vargas, the resulting potential changes to the
value of 12th grade for those who have demonstrated readiness and those who
haven’t make things tricky. Focus shouldn’t rest on avoiding remedial
coursework for students who aren’t ready for college and accelerating students
who are ready, he said. Teachers should be working to accelerate both groups
forward. Senior year can be a critical point of exposure to career options and
use of curriculum that both high schools and colleges view as bolstering
college readiness, something he sees as a shared responsibility between K-12
and higher education. Graduating seniors are, Vargas said, “the same students
who show up on [colleges’] doors three months later.” Barnett stressed the
importance of keeping seniors engaged, especially college-ready seniors who
have already determined their next steps after high school and may be tempted
to take it easy in 12th grade. Pre-college and dual enrollment opportunities
can offer seniors the challenge of more advanced coursework they need to keep
their academic momentum.

While their
peers begin college-level classes right away, what about students whose high
school test scores and coursework don’t signal readiness for college classes? Panelists
made clear the reason so much effort has gone into preparing students for
college-level work: high school students who head to campus without
demonstrating readiness for college have a much more difficult road ahead of
them. Barnett spoke bluntly about the relationship between remedial classes in
college and graduation. “If you start out in remedial education, you don’t have
a great shot,” she said, echoing Governor Markell’s earlier statement that being unable to
complete college after beginning is the “worst of all worlds, when you’ve had
to go into debt to pay for these classes and then you don’t get the degree at
the end of the road.” 

Knowing of the connection between remedial education and failure to graduate, how can
schools, colleges, and policymakers help students enter directly into
college-level work? Vargas recommended that colleges use a passing score from
any state readiness assessment for college placement purposes. “We should use
these assessments to maximize access,” he said, encouraging leaders to “lean
toward which [assessments] say you’re college-ready and then honor that,” he
argued.

Acknowledging that doing so will be complicated, the panelists nonetheless expressed hope that alignment of standards and use
of assessment will continue to remove barriers for students. Though, as Vargas
put it, we may not yet know exactly “which levers to pull” in the area of
alignment to maximize progress, existing programs built on K-12 and
postsecondary collaboration, such as early college,
point to the possibility that aligned assessment and standards can clear and
mark the path to higher education for many students who stand to benefit.