Early Assessment Program (EAP) Validity and Placement Clarification

Fall
2009
Resolution Number
18.02
 
Contact
Assigned to
President
Category
Matriculation
Status
Completed
Status Report

Contact has been made with the Chancellor's Office to gather the relevant data. A Rostrum article will follow.

The past president wrote it and tried to include everything in the world.  I do not think there are real issues anymore.

Whereas, Senate Bill (SB) 946 authorized all community colleges to use the Early Assessment Program (EAP) for “English and mathematics placement purposes at the discretion of the local college,” yet “placement” in the community colleges is not merely a determination of whether or not a student is college-ready;

Whereas, The Early Assessment Program (EAP) was developed and is used by the California State Universities (CSUs) to determine college readiness and exemption from CSU placement testing for English and mathematics college level courses, testing that merely determines whether or not a student is college-ready and was not intended for use in placement;

Whereas, The EAP currently lacks sufficient data validating the reliability of its cut-off values to indicate college readiness and is not an appropriate tool to address placement that ensures student success for the clearly defined four levels prior to college-level, which characterize the majority of California community college first-time students and therefore necessitate an assessment and placement process more complicated than that used by the CSU; and

Whereas, Current discussions about EAP as a “placement” tool are not clearly documented as to scope and application and therefore do not satisfy the California community colleges’ requirement of an accurate and validated assessment for placement of students in a range of English and mathematics courses;

Resolved, That the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges work with the Chancellor's Office to clarify and document guidelines explaining the limited scope of EAP assessment as a tool for placement into transfer level English and mathematics only, indicating that additional assessment is required to appropriately place students in English and mathematics courses below transfer level;

Resolved, That the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges work with the Chancellor's Office to obtain sufficient data on EAP implementation to evaluate the effectiveness of the use of EAP as a tool to determine readiness for and success in college-level work;

Resolved, That the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges work with its educational partners to create a clear explanation of the appropriate use of EAP in exempting California community colleges first-time students found "college-ready" by the EAP from additional California community colleges assessment and placement testing; and

Resolved, That the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges work to clarify implications of this placement such that the EAP placement results indicating "college-ready status" are seen by California State University transfer partners as equivalent to and satisfying completion of that prerequisite course in English or mathematics.

MSC Disposition: Chancellor’s Office, Local Senates