Survey Finds Gap between High School Curriculum and College Expectations

The ACT National Curriculum Survey 2005–2006, a study recently released by American College Testing (ACT), highlights the gap between how U.S. high schools are preparing students for college and what college teachers expect incoming students to know. The survey, completed by thousands of high school and college instructors across the country, found “that colleges generally want all incoming students to attain in-depth understanding of a selected number of fundamental skills and knowledge in their high school courses,” according to ACT. High schools, however, “tend to provide less in-depth instruction of a broader range of skills and topics.”

The survey found that the perceptions of high school teachers and college instructors are dramatically different in key areas. In some subjects, high school teachers are twice as likely as their college counterparts to believe that their state’s standards are effectively preparing students for college-level work. Views of the relative importance of specific skills vary considerably as well—a discrepancy that may contribute to the large numbers of college students who must enroll in remedial courses to master basic skills such as grammar and usage.

FINDINGS

High School Instruction and College Expectations

1. In English and writing, college instructors place more importance on basic grammar and usage skills than do high school teachers. Many college instructors express frustration that students who enter their classes often can't write a complete sentence, which forces college instructors to reteach basic skills and interferes with their efforts to teach higher-level skills.
2. In reading, high school and college instructors tend to agree on the relative importance of specific skills. However, instruction of reading skills diminishes in high school, suggesting the reading skills students have acquired in middle school are not being expanded or enriched in high school.
3. In mathematics, high school teachers tend to give advanced content greater importance than do college instructors. College instructors rate a rigorous understanding of math fundamentals as being more important than brief exposure to advanced content.
4. In science, high school teachers consistently rate knowledge of content (specific facts and information) as more important than understanding science process and inquiry skills. College instructors view science process skills as being more important.

State Standards and College-Level Work

• Seventy-six percent of high school English and writing teachers think that their state’s standards prepare students “well” or “very well” for college-level work in their content area, compared to just 33 percent of postsecondary English and writing instructors.
• Seventy-two percent of high school teachers think that their state’s standards prepare students for college-level work in reading, compared to just 36 percent of postsecondary instructors.
• Seventy-nine percent of high school teachers think that their state’s standards prepare students for college-level work in math, compared to just 42 percent of postsecondary instructors.
• Sixty-seven percent of high school teachers think that their state’s standards prepare students for college-level work in science, compared to just 32 percent of postsecondary instructors.

The full survey results are available from ACT.

DID YOU KNOW?

• Twenty-eight percent of first-year college students were enrolled in remedial coursework in fall 2000.
• High school teachers in all content areas tended to rate far more content and skills as “important” or “very important” than did their postsecondary counterparts—a finding consistent with concerns that some states sacrifice depth for breadth by requiring too many standards to be taught.
• A clear majority of both secondary (68 percent) and postsecondary (86 percent) instructors think that student preparation for college-level work today is the same as or worse than it was five to ten years ago, although postsecondary teachers are less likely than secondary teachers to think it is worse.