In Texas, when community college students are required to take remedial classes to get up to speed, those students often don’t make it far.
Now, as The Texas Tribune reports, the state is initiating a major overhaul of the community college remedial education system. The hope is that the new system will improve the odds of graduating for students who struggle in the beginning. The current statistics are dire. Only 15 percent of students who take a remedial math course end up passing a single college-level math class.
This is a symptom of a larger problem: 40 percent of Texas community college students aren’t considered college ready.
One issue is that remedial classes don’t count for college credit. The new plan involves getting those students into creditable classes sooner, by perhaps even splitting the semester in two and making the second half a non-remedial credit course.