ATD Success Team March 2 meeting minutes
3:00 – 5 pm
L 007 on the Forest Park campus
Everyone was welcomed. Today the team will continue to learn about developmental education at
STLCC. At the last meeting we learned about Dev Ed in general and about the NADE certification
process. Today we will learn about some of the innovative dev ed programs that are going on around
the college.
Patti Barnes and Pat Suess – Math Boot Camp - intensive review of basic concepts in pre-algebra Math
020 for students who completed advanced math courses in HS, yet placed into math 020.
4 day – 3.5 hr each and 3 hrs fourth day. Pre-test, mini lectures, individualized skill building, masterylevel testing, for recent hs grads (less than 18 months and scored between 26 and 59 on placement test
1 class will be offered per campus, 15 to 20 students, and tuition free for the pilot.
Integrated curriculum project – Nancy Linzy and Pat Suess develop an interdisciplinary 12 credit hr
course with RDG 030, Eng 030, Math 030 and PRD 100) Focused on 3 significant projects – four faculty
working in 2 person teams. Recruit 25 students currently in 020 courses. Meet Mon-Wed with one team
of faculty, and Tue-Thu with the other team, and for peer tutoring on Fridays. One set of class materials
in notebook.
Redesigning Pre-Algebra 020 – at MC – Aletta Speegle and Connie Stocker - Five modules, mastery
learning, can go fast or get PR grade and take two semesters if they meet attendance requirements and
master at least the first two modules. Attendance is 5% of the grade. Need an 80% or more on quizzes
or exams to go to next module. Students can attempt as many times as needed for mastery. Results
from Fall 10 – 16 out of 48 sections were redesigned. Results: C or better as % of A – F. 80.7% of
redesigned sections versus 61.7% of non redesigned sections. Retention and % of Fs were better too.
Developmental math edition, Lynda Fish Math 080-081 Students who get a D or PR have a much higher
retention rate than those who receive Fs or Ws. Find ways to stretch resources to serve high
enrollments. Connect with life skills program and evaluate transition program to have options for
unsuccessful students.
Questions – integrated curriculum is more than linked classes, really trying to be theme and project
based, contextualized with meaning team taught. Math leads with the scheduling and reading and
writing are folded in. Counseling support also needed to deal with students who are together all the
time, test anxiety with math, interpersonal growth and dynamics.
Do we have any data for students in read 16, math 20 and numbers of those with diagnosed LD. Juliet
did some research with 25 faculty, and estimated the number of intellectually disabled students were
between 70-101. Many economically disadvantaged are likely to not have testing. And some choose
not to disclose disability to the access office. The access office should be able to tell us what the
numbers are. Another question is: “At what threshold can we determine a student does not have the
capacity to succeed in the course?” What is the test score that shows no option of success? This is
easier than going down the access office route, because many students don’t disclose their disability to
the access office.
MC uses Plato for math lab, and MyMathLab for testing
WW used MyMathLab for everything
FV uses Hawk’s learning system for 020 and trying to decide what to use for 030 and 140
FP uses ModuMath from Wisconsin Technical Schools. They use MY math lab as a supplement to other
math courses.
Pathways to Success for Dr. Scherer – Students with Significant Cognitive Disabilities at STLCC.
Significant Cognitive Disability – previously referred to as mentally retarded, not learning disabled. LD
has difference between ability and performance. Significant cognitive disability is low on ability and
performance. Missouri has no exit exam – if just meet IEP goals you can get a regular HS diploma. A HS
diploma does not denote a standard set of competencies.
In 2008, pathways to success designed and offered at MC as a Continuing Ed class. Focuses on
communications, life skills and more. Misuse of the PR grade – faculty keep giving this grade to students
who have no chance of success. Also there is the impact of losing the students who do have a chance to
succeed because they feel they don’t belong with the cognitively disabled students.
English 030 and 101 – Vikki Cernich, ALP program under Peter Adams at CC of Baltimore County. (not FV
program. Take Eng 101 and 030 classes paired, 12 enrolled in 101 and 8 enrolled in 030. Students meet
together for 101 to get context and then the 8 students get one hour after class for additional help.
Classes are back to back with the same instructor. ALP stands for Accelerated Learning Program. Cohort
learning and exposure to higher functioning students helps to make this pairing successful for 030
students. Helps the students Make the connection between skills in 030 and the 101. Improves
behavioral issues because smaller class sizes and same teacher and the students feel they aren’t wasting
time. Fewer textbooks. ALP is heavy touch 6 hrs a week. College of Baltimore is scaling up to 150
sections this fall. More than 20 cc are piloting this approach across the country. Peter is working on a
faculty development model for teachers in the ALP program. Columbia College did an evaluation of the
program. Avoids leakage between courses by offering them simultaneously. CCBC has a summer
workshop in this method.
Global Skills Project -Rick Pescarino (FV math) and Lori Hirst (FP English) – We have two reps out of 25
faculty chosen nationwide for a four semester, two year project. Gates project to increase the pass
rates of basic skills students in US colleges. On line community of practice to improve pedagogy in dev.
Ed in English and Math. They share what is going on and working in the classroom, they are videotaped
3 times a semester, coaching sessions focusing on becoming better teachers. Develop portfolios.
Website: http://www.globalskillscc.org
Pearson’s My Reading Lab - Kathy Petroff, wanted adult level material for the reading lab. Using
MyReadigLab plus with customized Read 030 book. Now starting with lower level reading courses.
Encourage the students to use their 3 and 4 G phones to pull up MyReadigLab site. Integrating pre- and
post test into ecollege. Asking for single sign on through blackboard.
Donna - When we get together on March 23rd , we need to discuss how we move the student success
agenda forward beyond the ATD planning year. We have stated throughout this planning year process
that ATD is more than an initiative and that being an ATD school has simply provided us with an
opportunity to change how we do business at STLCC to impact student success. Many different needs –
particularly in regard to developmental education - have been brought forward at the campus and
district levels to provide us with a 3-5 year scope of work that needs to be addressed as the college’s
student success agenda. As we move forward, we need to know the role of this group will play as
strategy teams of the future bring forward their recommendations for action and potential
implementation. Most institutions we have talked with indicated that the ATD team they started with
has evolved as their work on student success has continued beyond the planning year.
Joe reminded the group that the emerging scholars program from FV is another success in addressing
needs of development students, and he suggested that we learn from those students and their
successes. The emerging scholars program focuses on students who start in 2 or more developmental
and successfully go on to complete college level work.
One role that needs to be addressed I monitoring of implementation and evaluation of progress on
strategies. This group will be asked for feedback on whether this group or some other group may be
responsible for ongoing monitoring of implementation of ATD strategies.
One of the team members expressed concern that many of our campus colleagues have not had the
same exposure to what this group has. There is uncertainty about what will be the role of the campus
based teams, especially since there still are some naysayers on the campuses.
Most of the ATD activities are focused on scaling up innovative activities.
Donna indicated that the developmental education strategy group may function somewhat differently
and may be on a different time line than the other strategy groups simply because the same people are
being tapped to put the new ACT and Compass scores in place.
Respectfully submitted by Joanie Friend