Abstract
The authors of Community Colleges and the Access Effect are experienced with developmental education at community colleges, and both currently work with underprepared students in some capacity. At first blush, they seem to be arguing themselves out of a job. This makes the book intriguing.
The central tenet is that federal student aid (FSA) should not be used for developmental education courses. In demonstrating this thesis, they have branched far and wide from performance funding and Bill Gates to intellectual disabilities (ID) and Dewey’s educational philosophy. Their tone is one of urgency, calling the common practice of allowing students to fund developmental coursework with FSA a “cruel hoax” (p. 2).
After the requisite introductory chapter on the history of community college, Chapter 2 tells the story of Pima Community College. Pima changed their policy on FSA making students enrolled in developmental curriculum ineligible for aid and promoting adult basic education pathways to college readiness. Essentially, the authors are promoting Pima’s model through federal regulatory changes and/or enforcement for community colleges.
Over the next few chapters, they take on the “completion agenda.” Beginning with the influence foundations have had on research agendas and state policy, the authors specifically criticize the Gates Foundation and the Lumina Foundation seeing their push to hurry students out of the developmental sequence as the conflation of correlation and causation. They take issue with characterizations of developmental education, naming “Enemy. Gated. Broken. Brick wall. Dysfunctional. Disaster. Bridge to nowhere. Burial ground” (p. 29) as unfair. They conclude that foundation leaders and researchers are vilifying the wrong folks.
This leads to a chapter outlining FSA regulations that the authors view as commonly ignored. The four regulations identified are (a) students cannot use FSA if they are only taking developmental coursework; (b) students needing more than 1 year of developmental coursework may not use FSA dollars; (c) courses below the high school level should not be FSA eligible; and (d) students without or with “dubious” high school diplomas should not be allowed to use FSA funding. In each case, the author’s strict understanding of the regulation is at odds with common practice. For example, students commonly take three developmental classes and one college orientation class, so that they are taking college-level coursework in addition to their developmental enrollment.
The authors are concerned with the practice of allowing students with intellectual disabilities and non-standard high school diplomas into college-level coursework funded with FSA. The authors go into great detail to describe the ways high school students with IDs are worked through the secondary curriculum and find themselves in possession of a high school credential that is identical to the diplomas of those without IDs.
The next few chapters offer an extended description of what the authors call the “access effect.” The shortened version is that the student who recognizes that she or he is not going to a selective institution decides that there is little reason to excel, because the community college down the road takes everyone with no regard to preparation. Workforce education is offered as the solution for students who are unlikely to complete a 4-year degree, and there are several programs from various states highlighted. Ironically, some of these programs, such as Breaking Through, are funded by the very foundations criticized early in the book.
In a chapter titled, “The Equity/Excellence Enrosque,” the authors compare the relationship between equity and excellence to a balanced ballroom dance, arguing that there is no equity if students do not graduate. All of this is connected to democracy and Dewey. They end the book with globalization and learning. It is a far ranging collection of ideas.
Scherer and Anson cover myriad topics relevant to limiting access to FSA, and argue their thesis well. As such, this book is a conversation starter and mover.
I have two concerns. First, little is said about the social ills community college students face daily and the web of social policies outside of education that attend those problems. In the chapter on technical programs, readers are told the stories of three students, Michael, Monique, and Breanne, who struggle with their personal responsibilities, past experiences, and a general lack of resources. However, the authors fail to connect these concerns to the life circumstances of these students (e.g., food stamps, housing, custody, child care), concluding only that the students would be better suited to short technical programs that advisors failed to describe. Research on non-traditional students often operates from the same perspective. For example, Martin, Galentino, and Townsend (2014) conducted interview research with community college graduates, faculty, and staff. They concluded that students who graduate have clear goals and the ability to manage external demands. Although this approach is helpful, it puts too much focus on the student as the problem to be fixed. Rather, research is needed on how social policies that are used by non-traditional students to manage their lives intersect with educational policies and practices. Scherer’s and Anson’s focus is higher education, but students’ lives are more complex than just college. The authors needed to make mention of the many other policies and complications that make it difficult for students to persist in college.
Second, the authors offer short-term technical programs infused with developmental education as a solution for students who cannot succeed in liberal arts curriculum, but they fail to address this persistent challenge with any specificity. Although combining technical and developmental education is an old idea (e.g., John Dewey), there are few examples of it being accomplished successfully. In a study of occupational programs at nine community colleges, Torraco (2008) asked graduates about the most helpful and least helpful aspects of their programs. Students most commonly named general education courses as least helpful and unrelated to their occupational goals. Scherer and Anson made the same point; however, Torraco noted that technological advances over the last decade, particularly in manufacturing and health care, mean that those working in these fields need a strong background in math. Plus, faculty in technical programs do not have the expertise or time in their courses to add instruction in mathematics. Although Scherer and Anson offer short technical programs as an obvious solution, Torraco made clear that the situation is complex and warrants further research.
The authors wisely note that they will not find themselves out of work if all college students were suddenly prepared. Rather, there would be a need for more faculty to teach college-level courses, a welcome problem. Community Colleges and the Access Effect is a worthy read in that it covers the broad range of issues and topics related to FSA. However, the “easy button” offered, disallowing the use of FSA dollars for developmental education has a number of implications for students and faculty that are not carefully considered.