![]() The hope is that they gain the foundational skills and knowledge the tests say they lack to have a fighting chance of succeeding at more difficult work. If they fail, they’ll be assigned to classes that, in essence, give them a second chance to learn what high school should have taught. The tests are a lifeline of sorts: If a student passes, they avoid remedial education despite low scores on the other exams. But I forced myself to get it done.”Īlexis, along with one of her friends and most of her schoolmates, ended up in remediation because they didn’t score high enough to meet cutoff points on either the SAT (480)/ACT (20) or New York State Regents exams (75) to be eligible for college-level classes in math, reading, or writing - and sometimes all three.Īs the BMCC students partied in the sun, others accepted for the fall were inside taking placement tests that would determine the course of their career at BMCC and possibly directly affect the rest of their lives. “I missed the score by one point! I was so mad. “Freshman year I took two in math,” she said. ![]() Her friends nod as if New Jersey must have been hard to overcome. She explains that unlike most there, she’s not from New York. A cheerful young woman named Alexis, about to complete her studies at BMCC, sits with friends at the student activities table. And the more remedial classes they need, the dimmer their academic future. What isn’t clear from the festivities in front of the school, whose enormous main building stretches four city blocks along the Hudson River, is that not only will most students fall short of a degree - about 40 percent nationally who started community college in 2010 earned a credential in six years - but also that 80 percent of the school’s incoming students each year are assigned to remedial classes, according to administrators.įrom that moment, if averages hold, their chances of earning a degree - of even passing a college course - sink. A few blocks from the Freedom Tower, it is also the only campus that had a building destroyed in the 9/11 attacks. Its size helps keep it near the top of the list nationally in the number of degrees it awards. With 27,000 students, BMCC is the largest of the seven community colleges in the City University of New York system (which also has 17 four-year and graduate schools). “Who was supposed to bring the water guns?” a flushed club leader, sweater draped over her head nomad-like, asked several people earnestly. It was different downtown, at the Tribeca campus of the Borough of Manhattan Community College, where the giddy spirit of students at a celebration of the school’s clubs felt more like a day at the beach. Pedestrians kept close to the shadow of buildings. Ninety degrees on a May afternoon, and New York’s streets wilted under unexpected heat. ![]() Sign up for free newsletters from The 74 to get more like this in your inbox. This story first appeared at The 74, a nonprofit news site covering education. ![]() When $7B in Remediation Falls Short: The Broken Promises Colleges Make to Students Who Need More Help We want our stories to be shared as widely as possible - for free. ![]()
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