Student Assessment : Science.

In 1983-84, the Center for the Study of Community Colleges developed and field-tested an instrument, the General Academic Assessment (GAA), to assess community college students' knowledge in several liberal arts areas, including the sciences. The GAA was completed by a sample of 8,024 students at four large, urban community college districts. The scores were cross tabulated by selected student characteristic variables (e.g., age, ethnicity, native language, and reason for attending college) and selected educational background variables (e.g., the number of college units already completed by the student, and the number of science courses the student had taken prior to the GAA test). While there appeared to be a positive correlation between an increase in age and scores on the science portion of the GAA, the difference was slight. A comparison of the scores of students who had completed less than 15 college units with the scores of students who had completed 60 or more units indicated that there were no great differences among minority ethnic groups in the rate of gain in the science section. Students attending college to satisfy a personal interest scored higher on the science questions than those intending to transfer or receiving occupational training. There was a positive correlation between the number of science courses completed and the students' GAA scores in this area. (EJV)

Practitioners. ericd

Microfiche. [Washington D.C.]: ERIC Clearinghouse microfiches : positive.