At Front Range Community College near Denver, Colorado, instructors and administrators were disappointed with student outcomes in the developmental math courses.
Front Range is the largest community college in Colorado, serving more than 30,000 students on four campuses. Students who needed to acquire basic math skills were required to take a two-semester developmental math sequence, but less than 70 percent of students typically passed the course. This was far below the expectations of both the college and the state of Colorado.
Instructors and administrators knew they needed to do more than make some tweaks to instruction – they needed an overhaul.
In 2013, they formed a committee and made the bold decision to move away from a traditional classroom structure of lecture, practice, homework and tests. Instead, they put a pilot program in place to test a personalized, online math program, starting with a few classes on one of the community college’s campuses.
“We didn’t implement technology for technology’s sake,” says Joe Brenkert, full-time instructor at Front-Range’s Westminster campus. “This was a part of a plan to fully change the mindset of both instructors and students about how to teach and learn math.”

Front Range chose MyMathLab, part of Pearson’s MyLab & Mastering collection of online homework, tutorial, and assessment digital learning technologies. Creating online learning experiences that are personalized and continuously adaptive, the tool provides data-driven guidance that helps students better absorb course material and understand difficult concepts.
On the very first day of the redesigned class, students found themselves directed to a computer lab, not a traditional classroom. Each student sat at their own workstation and was instructed to take a pretest.
“It was a major shift in expectations from day one,” said Brenkert. “These are students who haven’t been successful in math in the past. Taking a test on the very first day can cause them a lot of stress. Instructors had to be prepared.”
From the pretest on, students progressed individually. They met in a computer lab on regularly scheduled days, attended additional required lab hours, and completed homework. Students were required to score at least 75 percent on a posttest before moving to the next module. Students who scored less than 75 percent were required to complete a study plan, redo homework, make test corrections and meet with an instructor before they could retaking the test.
But even before the students started wrapping their minds around this new technology and class structure, administrators needed to be convinced that the course required as much work from teachers as a traditional class. After all, students were receiving most of their content from a computer, right?

“Their first reaction was that the course was now more of tutoring or lab class, and not much work would be required from instructors,” says Brenkert. “The truth is that it required just as much or more preparation.”
To prepare, Brenkert and his colleagues analyzed student performance reports. They could see where each student was in the module, and more specifically, where students needed help. They then spent classroom time meeting with students personally and going over concepts and questions. The data from work completed in MyMathLab is thorough and immediate, so instructors could also see who was spending time on their work and who wasn’t.
To get a sense of the overall success of the course, instructors compared data from the pilot course that integrated MyMathLab into instruction to the traditional courses. Several measures showed significant student progress:
- The newly redesigned course had a higher number of final course grades of A and B, and had no Cs.
- On average, students in the redesigned course progressed through 95 percent of the material, nearly 40 percent higher than in the traditional class.
In the redesigned course, instructors are clearly able to identify what and how much of the course material the students have mastered, personalizing instruction for each student. Instead of having to retake the entire course to complete their developmental math requirement, they can complete just the modules needed.
The student experience also improved in the new course. The majority of students were energized and excited about the individualized pacing. Other reactions included:
- 91 percent of students rated their experience in the class as positive or very positive. The overall rating of the class, on a 0-5 scale, was 4.5.
- 77 percent of students reported they received more support in the class than in a traditional math class.
Besides improved performance, committee members observed some unanticipated benefits.
Although some administrators and teachers feared that students would procrastinate when left to control their own schedule learning in the digital environment, they found that the opposite was true. Most students effectively paced themselves, and for others, it was a chance for instructors to discuss study skills like time management, note taking and test preparation.
Another advantage emerged as some students accelerated their own pace enough to complete two courses within one semester, freeing up time to focus on other classes and interests.

Finally, both teachers and students were positive about the increased amount of student-teacher interaction and stronger student relationships, mainly because of the class structure where one-on-one meetings were emphasized. Since instructors had detailed data on each student, these meetings were productive. Brenkert noticed that he and students could focus together on specific course material, or on more general student skills.
“I’ll look at the data from a student who’s about to take a test,” says Brenkert. “I take notes on whether they’ve done their homework and how long they’ve spent on it. When I meet with the student, I get their point of view – how do they think they’re doing? What do they need to study most? I’ll add my own observations to the conversation, and we work together to form a plan to move forward.”
Front Range is continuing to expand its use of MyMathLab and this school year more than 200 students each semester are now learning with the digital program.
Overall, instructors agreed that the new course showed enough benefits to continue to expand and improve it. Instructors are working on additional resources to add to the digital curriculum and continuously evaluating ways to best motivate students.
The best motivation so far seems to be coming from the one-on-one interactions and the feeling of success once material is mastered. Students are recommending the digital course to friends and have reported that they feel more confident. For students who have had bad experiences with math in the past, the course has been a game changer. As one student says, “I feel as though I am good at math now.”
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