Toward Multiple Measures for Math Placement at Mid Michigan Community College Peter Velguth, Ph. D. Scott Mertes, Brandon Kish, jessie Gordon, Brent Mishler, Emma Gunu, Kim Oren

Mid Michigan Community College Rural setting in Harrison MI Second campus Mt Pleasant Student body ~ 4,300 headcount – Full and part time About 25% dual enrollees Range of programs, both career centered and transfer More than half of CC students take developmental math Various legislatures question paying for math twice High stakes placement tests – students may be placed 1, 2, or 3 levels below transfer level math Placement at MMcC at the start of this work Accuplacer primarily SAT, ACT

Prior Research (CCRC) Hughes and Scott Clayton (2011) Assessing Developmental Assessment in Community Colleges Scott Clayton (2011) Do High-Stakes Placement Exams Predict College Success?  Belfield and Crosta (2012) Predicting Success in College: The Importance of Placement Tests and High School Transcripts Prior Research (CCRC)

2012 Placement Accuplacer or ACT - based cutoffs Origin – Math faculty and student services

Data, methods, personnel Data – First Time Freshmen from Fall Terms 2012, 2013, 2014 Analysis – Predict course success (“C” or Better) with transcript data: courses, grades, cumulative GPA, ACT Coding of courses Logistic regression Data, methods, personnel

Example HS Math course taxonomies Courses “binned” into categories

Significant variables 101 Basic Mathematics Geometry, Accounting 104 Basic Algebra HSGPA, Accuplacer 105 Intermediate Algebra HSGPA Predictive model from logistic regression based on HSGPA alone. Acceptable to all stakeholders?

Example analysis

Research since study inception Peter Bahr and MCCA (2017)

Formulas to Implementation

Example HS Math course taxonomies Courses “binned” into categories

Future Preliminary result of new placement Culture of placement Placement rates – decreased developmental Increased college level Grades analysis pending after fall term complete Culture of placement IT Student services/ admissions Math faculty English faculty