Paul Attewell

New Evidence on College Remediation

Using college transcripts, we separate the effects of remedial coursework from high school preparation. For two-year colleges, taking remedial classes was not associated with less academic success. In four-year colleges, there are negative effects of remedial coursework, but many minority students who complete a bachelors degree do so after taking remediation.

What is Skill

The concept of skill plays an important role in sociological research, from studies of the labor process to debates over equal worth. This article provides a theoretical analysis of the ambiguities and difficulties involved in current sociological conceptions of skill, contrasting four distinct approaches to skill: positivist, ethnomethodological, Weberian, and Marxist. Some of the impasses in industrial sociology arguably stem from the fact that opposed traditions are using very different notions of skill or are blind to their own preconceptions regarding skill. The article draws out the implications of this for empirical research.

Raising the Bar: Curricular Intensity and Academic Performance

Using national transcript data, the authors examine inequality in access to an advanced curriculum in high school and assess the consequences of curricular intensity on test scores and college entry. Inequalities in curricular intensity are primarily explained by student socioeconomic status effects that operate within schools rather than between schools. They find significant positive effects of taking a more intense curriculum on 12th-grade test scores and in probabilities of entry to and completion of college. However, the effect sizes of curricular intensity are generally modest, smaller than advocates of curricular upgrading policies have implied.

Computers and Young Children: Social Benefit or Social Problem?

Using time-diary data from a national sample of young school-age children, we examine the correlates of time spent at home on computing for cognitive and other measures of well-being. We observe modest benefits associated with home computing on three tests of cognitive skill, and on a measure of self-esteem. Most young children who spend time at home on computer-based activities spend no less time on activities such as reading, sports or outside play than children without home computers. However, young children who use home computers a lot, for over 8 hours a week, spend much less time on sports and outdoor activities than non-computer-users. They also have substantially heavier body mass index than children who do not use home computers.

The Winner-Take-All High School: Organizational Adaptations to Educational Stratification

Across the United States, families seek schools with reputations for academic excellence for their children, assuming that such schools improve a talented child’s prospects for college admission. This article shows that students from “star” public high schools experience a disadvantage in entering elite colleges that stems from the attention played to class rank. In response, some high schools have developed “winner-take-all” characteristics, enhancing the success of their top students at the expense of other students. Students below the top of their class do less well than would be expected in terms of grades and advanced placement courses. They also take fewer advanced math and science subjects, given their high academic skills, compared to equivalent students in less prestigious schools. These patterns are linked to a system of educational stratification that links colleges and high schools through several types of assessment games.

Competing Explanations of Undergraduate Noncompletion

In this paper we analyze longitudinal data from a nationally representative panel of college entrants to test and compare several theoretical explanations of college degree attainment and noncompletion. So far, relatively little emphasis has been placed on determining the relative and combined predictive power of competing explanations or mechanisms of college noncompletion. We utilize a methodological tool—the sheaf coefficient—to combine multiple variables into single conceptual predictors and estimate their relative effect sizes across college types. We then draw implications of these findings both for theory and for policy.

What Is Academic Momentum? And Does It Matter?

The academic momentum perspective suggests that the speed with which undergraduates initially progress in college significantly affects their likelihood of completing a degree, an effect separate from those of high school academic preparation and family socioeconomic status. Growth curve modeling of undergraduate transcript data reveals that the number of credits attempted in the first semester of college sets a trajectory that influences later chances of degree completion. Several techniques addressing selection bias indicate that delay between high school and starting college, and also attempting a low course load in the first semester (part-time attendance), are associated with lower degree completion, while attending summer school after freshman year is associated with significantly better graduation chances. In sum, the central claims of momentum theory are supported.

The Community College Route to the Bachelor’s Degree

It is well established that students who begin post-secondary education at a community college are less likely to earn a bachelor’s degree than otherwise similar undergraduates who begin at a 4-year school, but there is less consensus over the mechanisms generating this disparity. We explore these using national longitudinal transcript data and propensity-score methods. Inferior academic preparation does not seem to be the main culprit: We find few differences between students’ academic progress at each type of institution during the first 2 years of college and (contrary to some earlier scholarship) students who do transfer have BA graduation rates equal to similar students who begin at 4-year colleges. However, after 2 years, credit accumulation diverges in the two kinds of institutions, due in part to community college students’ greater involvement in employment, and a higher likelihood of stopping out of college, after controlling for their academic performance. Contrary to some earlier claims, we find that a vocational emphasis in community college is not a major factor behind the disparity. One important mechanism is the widespread loss of credits that occurs after undergraduates transfer from a community college to a 4-year institution; the greater the loss, the lower the chances of completing a BA. However, earlier claims that community college students receive lower aid levels after transfer and that transfers disproportionately fail to survive through the senior year are not supported by our analyses.

The Bridge and the Troll Underneath: Summer Bridge Programs and Degree Completion

College graduation rates in the United States are low in both real and relative terms. This has left all stakeholders looking for novel solutions while perhaps ignoring extant but underused programs. This article examines the effect of “summer bridge” programs, which have students enroll in coursework prior to beginning their first full academic year, on associate’s and bachelor’s degree completion. We make use of the Beyond Postsecondary (BPS) transcript data as well as data from one large university system. Our analysis utilizes propensity score matching to account for selection effects among students. We find that at community colleges and less selective 4-year colleges, students who attend bridge programs are 10 percentage points more likely to finish within 6 years. We discuss our findings in the context of how colleges might better use their existing initiatives to improve student outcomes, and in light of recent findings from a randomized controlled trial study.

College Selectivity and Degree Completion

How much of a difference does it make whether a student of a given academic ability enters a more or a less selective four-year college? Some studies claim that attending a more academically selective college markedly improves ones graduation prospects. Others report the reverse: an advantage from attending an institution where ones own skills exceed most other students. Using multilevel models and propensity score matching methods to reduce selection bias, we find that selectivity does not have an independent effect on graduation. Instead, we find relatively small positive effects on graduation from attending a college with higher tuition costs. We also find no evidence that students not attending highly selective colleges suffer reduced chances of graduation, all else being equal.