Description of ALP

The Accelerated Learning Project (ALP) is a form of mainstreaming developed at the Community College Baltimore County. ALP attempts to combine the strongest features of earlier mainstreaming approaches and, thereby, to raise the success rates and lower the attrition rates for students placed in developmental writing.

Table 4 illustrates the structure of the ALP courses.

Table 4: ALP sections of ENG 101 and ALP companion course.

Under ALP, students whose placement is in the upper level developmental writing course are invited to register for one of the designated sections of ENG 101. Participation in ALP is completely voluntary. These sections have 8 seats reserved for ALP students, shown in pink in Table 4. The other 12 seats are designated for students whose placement is ENG 101, shown in blue.

These same eight ALP students also register for a section of the ALP companion course which meets in the class period immediately following the ENG 101 section, but in another room. The same instructor teaches both the 101 and the companion course.

An important feature of ALP is the relationship that develops among the eight students, who take the two courses together, and also between them and the instructor, who teaches both sections.

The English 101 class is conducted just like a regular 101 class. We consider it essential that we maintain the same standards and cover the same material in the 101 class as we would in any 101 section.

The instructor for the ALP 052 section has one goal: to do whatever will maximize the ALP students’ likelihood of success in the 101 class.

• answering questions left over from the 101 class
• discussing ideas for the next essay in 101
• reviewing drafts of essays the students are working on for 101
• writing short papers that reinforce what has been discussed in the 101 class or prepare for what will be discussed in the 101 class
• working on grammar and punctuation
• discussing how to succeed as a college student
• discussing problems interfering with the students’ progress in 101

Students pay for six credits for the two courses. The ENG 101 counts as a three-credit course, but they do not receive credit for the companion course; in the state of Maryland college credit cannot be awarded for developmental courses.

There are four possible outcomes for students:

• If they pass both courses, they take the next course in the writing sequence, ENG 102.
• If they pass the companion course but not 101, they must next take 101 again.
• If they fail both courses, they must either take the ALP courses again or take the traditional developmental writing course.
• In the unlikely case that they pass 101 but fail the companion course, they take the next course in the writing sequence ENG 102, but a U in the companion course is recorded on their transcripts. This did not happen in the first year of ALP.

Faculty receive 3 credits on-load assignment for the 101, but only 2 credits for the companion course. Even though the companion course meets for three hours per week, faculty have found this arrangement equitable because of the small class size and because it is not a completely separate preparation.