Can Making Developmental Education Optional Close the Racial/Ethnic Achievement Gap in Gateway Course Success?

• In Event: 29.043 - Tracing the Labyrinth: Exploring the Interaction Between Campus Governance and Public Policy

Abstract

In 2013, the Florida legislature passed Senate Bill 1720 (SB 1720) that, among other mandates, made developmental (or remedial) education and traditional college placement tests optional for many students, regardless of prior academic preparation. Now that these barriers to college-level courses—barriers which have faced scrutiny as to their accuracy and equity—have been removed, we sought to better understand whether there was any relationship between their removal and a reduction (or elimination) of the ethnic/racial achievement gap in gateway (introductory college-level) courses. Using a difference-in-differences design, we find that the gap in the share of similarly prepared incoming Black and White college students passing gateway math has closed, while Hispanic students are outperforming similarly prepared White students.

Authors

• Toby Park, Florida State University

• Chenoa S. Woods, Florida State University

• Shouping Hu, Florida State University

• Tamara Bertrand Jones, Florida State University

• Oguzcan Cig, Florida State University

• David Allen Tandberg, State Higher Education Executive Officers