Cal State Expels 2,009 Students for Lack of Skills

Cracking down on unprepared students, the California State University system kicked out about 2,000 students--more than 6% of last year’s freshman class--for failing to master basic English and math skills within their first year of classes.

Of those, 185 were at Cal State Fullerton, 7.7% of last year’s freshmen on that campus.

In an annual report on remedial education released Tuesday, university officials also said they have stepped up efforts to help high school juniors and seniors improve their skills before college.

As a result, officials said, the 22-campus state university system seems to be making some progress in its effort to ease out of the remedial education business.

The overall percentage of university students who show up needing at least one remedial math class dropped to 45%, a second year of improvement, the report concluded. Yet the fraction of entering students deficient in English composition skills remained steady at 46%.

“It looks like our interventions are beginning to work,” said Charles B. Reed, chancellor of the university system. “But we cannot let up. This is going to be a long, sustained uphill battle.”

Figures showed that the proportion of Cal State Fullerton freshmen entering in 2000 who needed to enroll in remedial math was 41%, while the showing for remedial English was 49%.

The math percentages at CSUF have been falling steadily, from 54% for the freshmen entering in 1998. The number of freshmen forced to take remedial English, meanwhile, is little changed from 51% in 1998.

The new figures were released to the board of trustees, which has directed the university to reduce remedial education to no more than 10% of freshmen by 2007.

Cal State officials are encouraged by the two-year trend in math proficiency, suggesting that its multi-pronged effort is beginning to pay off.

One of those prongs was to get tough on Cal State students who arrive on campus without the skills needed to do university-level work.

Although campus enforcement varies widely, the university notified 2,009 students systemwide last summer that they cannot re-enroll as sophomores. They were instructed to go to a community college to prepare them to pass Cal State’s placement tests in math and English.

That was a higher percentage than the 5%--or 1,440 freshmen--who were expelled the year before.

All this pressure is aimed at persuading students to learn these skills before entering college.

Cal State has focused most of its efforts at the high school level. Under a $9-million program, Cal State faculty and hundreds of university students majoring in math and English have been working closely with 150 high schools that send the greatest number of students needing remedial work.

This targeted “outreach” program does not focus on the lowest performing students. Instead, it focuses on those following a college-prep track, helping them with first- and second-year algebra and English composition to prepare them for the university.

Grant Fraser, a Cal State Los Angeles math professor, believes that the faculty members and 44 student tutors sent into 11 high schools in his target area are beginning to make a difference. His campus witnessed a six percentage-point drop in freshmen needing remedial math.

“We touched about 2,000 students last spring,” he said. “Students didn’t realize the importance of the Entry Level Math [placement] exam and they had incredibly weak basic skills.”

Fraser expects this will be a multiyear effort to make dramatic differences. One key victory will be to persuade students to take math as high school seniors.

Gov. Gray Davis proposed $8 million to double the size of Cal State’s outreach program to 300 schools.

Cal State isn’t the only college or university wrestling with remedial education, which critics often say is tantamount to double billing taxpayers for the failure of public high schools to properly prepare students.

Nationwide, 29% of all college freshmen enroll in at least one remedial class in reading, writing or math. Yet Cal State’s trustees want to reduce remedial classes, which cost the system about $10 million a year, tie up professors’ time and slow down the progress of students.

Unlike last year’s decision by the City University of New York to bar remedial students until they are fully prepared, Cal State is trying to slowly reduce the percentage of students who need remedial classes by helping improve California’s public school system.

Although Cal State officials took pride in math improvements, they were frustrated that English composition skills remain below standard in 46% of all Cal State freshmen--who by definition are in the top one-third of their high-school graduating class.

“The question is, why aren’t we seeing results in English?” asked Ephraim Smith, CSUF’s vice president for academic affairs.

One reason, Smith and others suggested, was that 40% of Cal State students come from immigrant households where English is not the primary language spoken. So instead of needing remediation, they are learning English for the first time.

But that does not account for the high percentage of African American students--66% this past fall--who needed remedial help in English.

“We don’t know specifically why blacks don’t do as well,” said Dave Spence, Cal State’s executive vice chancellor and chief academic officer. “We do know that it’s related to educational opportunity. It’s a socioeconomic thing.”

CSUF found that 78% of African Americans needed remedial classes in math, compared with 55% of Mexican Americans, 36% of whites and 29% of Asian Americans.

When it came to English, 63% of Asian Americans entering CSUF needed remedial classes, compared with 62% of Mexican Americans, 60% of blacks and 33% of whites.

In his presentation to the trustees, Spence noted that Cal State has the highest standards of any public university in the nation.

Aside from Cal State’s own placement tests, one way that students can opt out of remedial classes is to score a minimum of 550 on the math and 550 on the verbal sections of the SAT. In some states the minimum is as low as 440.

“If we had the same standards as other places, we would be down to 30%” needing remedial classes, Spence said, considerably closer to the trustees’ goal of 10%.

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Times staff writer Jeff Gottlieb contributed to this report.