Improving Student Outcomes Through Placement Reform

Many colleges still test entering students to determine if they're academically prepared for college-level math and English courses. These single, high-stakes tests have proven to be ineffective predictors of students' abilities to succeed in college-level courses. They are also barriers to early college success for learners from low-income backgrounds and adult learners.

To help solve this problem, in 2020, we gave MDRC, in partnership with the Community College Research Center (CCRC) at Teachers College, Columbia University, a $2.3 million grant to expand the adoption of multiple measures assessment (MMA) systems for student placement in math and English. There is no single, correct way to design and implement MMA to improve course placements. MMA programs generally use high school GPA and other measures, in addition to placement test scores, to assign incoming students to either developmental or college-level courses in math and English.

Results from this initiative have been encouraging, as seen in a 2022 study of two recently completed experimental reviews of MMA. They found that students who were “bumped up” into college-level English courses by multiple measures were 16 percentage points more likely to have completed the course by the end of their third college semester compared to those who started in a developmental course. For math, students were 11 percentage points more likely to complete the course.

Though more research is needed to determine the impact this has on equity gaps in math and English college course completion, these findings are nevertheless promising. Particularly so as the COVID-19 health crisis has left colleges open to alternative placement systems that are easy to use in a remote or virtual setting. This approach is the kind of intervention we aim to continue to support in our Remove Structural Barriers to Success focus area.