PROCEEDINGS OF THE 15TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON RESEARCH IN UNDERGRADUATE MATHEMATICS EDUCATION (Vol 2)
2012
Portland, Oregon
Identifying Developmental Students Who are At-Risk: An Intervention Using Computer-Assisted Instruction at a Large Urban Community College
Page: 2-301
Nationally, developmental mathematics courses can have completion rates as low as 25%, which can be a major barrier to degree completion. This article argues that specific institutional interventions can do much to ameliorate this situation by describing a particular intervention implemented in remedial courses at an urban community college over three semesters. Changes to the developmental mathematics course structure included using a mandatory departmental midterm to identify at-risk students and implementing a series of required intervention assignments using an online homework system in conjunction with regular class time for those students identified as at-risk. Significant gains in retention rates were obtained, with retention in some semesters as high as 50% greater than in the semester prior to the intervention. In addition, in this study, at-risk students who spent at least twenty hours on intervention assignments obtained retention rates that were approximately twenty-two percentage points higher than the average remedial student.