Latest ACT National Curriculum Survey^® Shows Lack of Content Alignment Between High School and College

The study, which surveyed college and high school instructors across the country, reveals that colleges generally want incoming students to have in-depth understanding of a selected number of fundamental skills and knowledge, while high schools tend to provide less in-depth instruction of a broader range of skills and topics.

The problem lies more with the state education standards that high school teachers are required to follow than with the teachers themselves, according to Cynthia Schmeiser, president and chief operating officer, ACT education division.

“State learning standards are often too wide and not deep enough,” said Schmeiser. “They are trying to cover too much ground—more ground than colleges deem necessary—in the limited time they have with students. As a result, key academic skills needed for success in college get short shrift. This is a serious problem that states must address to better prepare our young people for success after high school.”

College instructors take a dim view of the effectiveness of their state’s learning standards. Nearly two-thirds (65 percent) overall say their state standards prepare students “poorly” or “very poorly” for college-level work in their subject areas. By contrast, most high school teachers report their state standards prepare students “well” or “very well.”

There clearly is a significant gap between what high school and college teachers expect of students. State policymakers and education leaders must work to close this gap by taking a more P–16 approach to education and working to align their learning standards with college requirements.

Differences between what high schools are teaching and what colleges want incoming students to know exist across the curriculum:

• In math, high school teachers tend to give advanced content greater importance than do college instructors. College instructors rate a rigorous understanding of fundamentals as being more important than exposure to advanced content.
• In science, high school teachers consistently rate knowledge of content (specific facts and information) as more important than an understanding of science process and inquiry skills. College instructors, in contrast, take a different view—science process skills are more important than knowledge of specific content.
• 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 their students often can’t write a complete sentence. They have to re-teach these basic skills before they can turn their efforts to teaching higher-level skills.
• In reading, high school and college instructors tend to agree on the relative importance of specific skills. However, instruction in reading skills decreases dramatically in high school after 10th grade, suggesting the skills students learn in middle school/junior high are not being built upon in later years.

Some states, such as Indiana and Kentucky, have already taken steps to improve the alignment of their learning standards with college expectations, Schmeiser said, but not yet enough to suggest a national trend.

“There are a number of state initiatives under way that have taken a P–16 approach to address the issue of misalignment,” she said. “We applaud those efforts, and we hope other states will follow suit.”

Instructors of middle school, high school, first-year college, and college remedial courses across the country completed a total of 6,568 surveys. The surveys covered various subject areas, including English, writing, math, science, social studies, and reading.

Respondents were provided a list of specific topics and skills in their content area and asked to rate how important each is for students to learn and know. Secondary teachers were also asked if they teach each topic or skill in their classes.