Reducing the Need for Postsecondary Remediation Using Self-efficacy to Identify Underprepared African-American and Hispanic Adolescents

Abstract

Introduction. Postsecondary remedial education is a major problem for Higher Education affecting retention rates, degree completion rates and cost of enrollment. Identification of students who are underprepared for managing the rigors of college and who would benefit from early intervention is necessary to reduce the need for postsecondary remediation. This study examines student perceptions of self-efficacy and use of self-regulatory behaviors as a possible indicator for need for remediation. Method. Sixty-three 10th and 11th grade Texas students (52.5% African American, 44.3% Hispanic, 3.2% others) participated in the study. Two self-regulation inventories, the SRI-HS and LASSI-HS, were administered to determine student self-efficacy and their use of self-regulatory behaviors. A Predictive Discriminant Analysis was used to successfully classify level of self-efficacy of a group of African American and Hispanic adolescents into 3 mutually exclusive groups, [high (81%), moderate (65%) or low (72%)] based on scores from the two self-regulation inventories. Results. A Kruskal-Wallis analysis revealed areas of the SRI-HS and LASSI-HS inventories where low self-efficacy African American and Hispanic students scored significantly lower than their high self-efficacy counterparts on self-reported use of self-regulatory skills and behaviors. Both inventories revealed problems in managing distractions, attitude, concentration, help-seeking, study strategies, goal setting, attention, selecting the main idea, and test strategies; important skills needed by under-prepared students and would be useful in intervention. Attitude was the lowest percentile score (15th percentile) for high and low self-efficacy groups. The PDA model correctly identified students (72.9% of the grouped cases) making such a model useful for predicting students with low academic self-efficacy (72%) to identify underprepared students; students that could benefit from self-efficacy and self-regulation intervention. Discussion. The results support the hypothesis that students that have high self-efficacy tend to use more self-regulatory skills and behaviors than students with lower self-efficacy. This finding suggests high self-efficacy is a link to higher achievement and therefore, less likelihood of needing post-secondary remediation. Suggestions for improving student self-efficacy self-regulation and attitude in both high and low self-efficacy, underprepared students are offered to decrease the likelihood of need for post-secondary remediation. Keywords: Underprepared students, Self-Efficacy, Self-Regulation, African American, Hispanic, Adolescent, Attitude