Community colleges will support the development of alternative basic skills curricula and incentivize colleges to take to scale successful model programs for delivering basic skills instruction.

Description

The Task Force believes that the community college system must develop more effective models of basic skills instruction and implement them on a large scale. We cannot simply place students into classes that use the same mode of instructional delivery that failed to work for them in high school. Within the system, colleges have developed or adopted alternatives to the traditional curriculum that show great promise in revolutionizing the delivery basic skills instruction to adults. For example: (1) the use of learning communities; (2) modularized instruction; (3) intensive instruction; (4) supplemental instruction; (5) contextualized learning—particularly within Career Technical Education Programs; and (6) team teaching, all illustrate new and innovate ways of teaching adults.

There are also new models of basic skills instruction that have yet to be created. To encourage innovation, the community colleges should provide incentives for developing alternative curricula and taking to scale model programs that work.