Beyond the Cut Point: College Writing Readiness for Linguistically Diverse Students

• In Event: 31.080 - English Language Learners in Community Colleges: Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

This paper highlights concerns regarding the overrepresentation of linguistically diverse students—those who speak a language other than English in the home—in English remediation. Recent studies have indicated that inaccurate tests have been misplacing some college-ready students into remediation courses (Hughes & Scott-Clayton, 2011; Ngo & Melguizo, 2015; Scott-Clayton, Crosta, & Belfield, 2014), and that being misplaced into English remediation may increase the likelihood of dropping out of college altogether by 8% (Scott-Clayton & Rodriguez, 2014). This study analyzes a unique dataset comprised of the essay test scores of linguistically diverse students (N=284) deemed the most susceptible to English course misplacement because their prior writing scores clustered around the designated college readiness cut-point.

Although revising is critical to produce college-level writing (Fitzgerald, 1987), most essay tests do not provide enough time for students to make the changes associated with college-level revising (Butler & Britt, 2011). Given research indicates revising enables English language learners to achieve the same outcomes as students whose initial drafts more closely resemble standards (Choi, 2013; Stefanou & Revesz, 2015; Williams, 2012), bilingual students may also need to perform more iterations of the writing process―signaling more revision―in order to execute a final draft of the same academic quality as their monolingual peers (Polio, 2012; Polio & Fleck, 1998). An essay test is therefore unlikely to capture a bilingual student’s true ability to produce college writing free of time restrictions.

The study gauged the variability of a student’s English course placement based on two essay test scores. The first essay was written under standard test conditions, while the second gave test takers additional time to revise the first essay. The sample consisted of 284 students shown to be among the most vulnerable to remediation misplacement because their SAT scores were in a close range of the cut-point. At the same time, the sample’s GPA—above 3.78—“is an extremely good and consistent predictor of college performance” (Belfield & Crosta, 2012, p. 39). The analysis demonstrates that 80% of the sample made score gains based on an additional time allowance. Importantly, 64% of students initially scored below the remediation cut-point suggests that the first test score may not have accurately reflected their true ability to write successfully in college.

Bilingual students represent 61.8 million of U.S. students enrolled in K-12 education in 2010 (U.S. Census Bureau, 2013). Despite their growing numbers, few studies have explored the relationship between English placement test scores and the educational outcomes of linguistically diverse students, in part, because postsecondary “institutions do not systematically collect information on” students’ language backgrounds (Flores & Drake, 2014, p. 4). Our results warrant future studies that explore the extent to which linguistically diverse students may rely on revising more than their advantaged peers to meet college writing standards (Solano-Flores, 2008).

Authors

• Stefani Rose Relles, University of Nevada - Las Vegas

• Blanca E. Rincón, University of Nevada - Las Vegas