Hojung Lee

The landscape of developmental education has experienced significant shifts over the last decade nationwide, as more than 20 states and higher education systems have transitioned from the traditional prerequisite model to corequisite remediation. Drawing on administrative data from Tennessee community colleges from 2010 to 2020, this study examined the heterogeneous effects of corequisite reform for remediation-eligible students with varying levels of academic preparation. Using difference-in-differences and event study designs, we found that corequisite remediation significantly improved gateway and subsequent college-level course completion for students in all placement test score groups below the college-level threshold. For math, the positive effects on college-level course completion were stronger for higher-scoring remedial students than for those with lower placement test scores, whereas the pattern was reversed for English. However, since the corequisite reform, students requiring remediation were more likely to drop out of the public college system, and those with the lowest scores were less likely to earn short-term certificates.

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Career and Technical Education (CTE) prepares students for life beyond high school by providing practical labor skills, workforce credentials, and early post-secondary credits. States are required to report the number of CTE concentrators to receive federal Perkins funding, but systems of identifying students as concentrators vary among states. We analyzed two distinct concentrator identification strategies, one based on local education agency administrator reporting and another universal screening system using transcript data. Analyses revealed moderate amounts of mismeasurement in concentration status and modest amounts of systematic mismeasurement penalizing students who qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, English language services, and special education services.

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Levels of governance (the nation, states, and districts), student subgroups (racially and ethnically minoritized and economically disadvantaged students), and types of resources (expenditures, class sizes, and teacher quality) intersect to represent a complex and comprehensive picture of K-12 educational resource inequality. Drawing on multiple sources of the most recently available data, we describe inequality in multiple dimensions. At the national level, racially and ethnically minoritized and economically disadvantaged students receive between $30 and $800 less in K-12 expenditures per pupil than White and economically advantaged students. At the state and district levels, per-pupil expenditures generally favor racially and ethnically minoritized and economically disadvantaged students compared to White and economically advantaged students. Looking at nonpecuniary resources, minoritized and economically disadvantaged students have smaller class sizes than their subgroup counterparts in the average district, but these students also have greater exposure to inexperienced teachers. We see no evidence that district-level spending in favor of traditionally disadvantaged subgroups is explained by district size, average district spending, teacher turnover, or expenditures on auxiliary staff, but Black and Hispanic spending advantage is correlated with the relative size of the Black and Hispanic special education population.

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