Math courses present barriers to student success in California Community Colleges

Large numbers of students in California’s 112 community colleges are struggling to pass college-level math classes, including courses they need to complete a degree or transfer to a four-year institution.

Community college students’ success in rigorous math is crucial to their futures and to any effort to improve college completion rates in California. But an EdSource analysis found that in fall 2010 just 55% of students who enrolled in a math course that they could apply toward an associate degree or use to transfer passed it during the term.

What makes math completion especially challenging is that students often come to math with a high degree of anxiety, frequently rooted in earlier failures. Succeeding in math at the outset could provide students with “early momentum” that would contribute to their overall success in college. Conversely, lack of success could discourage them from completing their studies. Increasing the success rates in more advanced math courses remains a continuing challenge for California and the nation.

This issue brief describes the findings of EdSource's analysis and underscores the need to make math success a priority at not only the developmental or remedial level, but at all levels of math instruction.

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EdSource thanks the S.D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation, The James Irvine Foundation, The Dirk and Charlene Kabcenell Foundation, and the Stuart Foundation for their support of our work, including this report.