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The first section of this two-part paper presents a brief discussion of the planning, pilot implementation, and benefits of Assessment and Advisement 100, a one-unit, self-paced, student development course offered at Mesa Community College. The course was designed to help entering students define why they are in college, determine what they want from the college experience, develop a plan to achieve their educational goals, and correlate their educational goals with career selection. The benefits of the course, determined through various pilot tests conducted during 1979, include improved retention, an increasingly internalized locus of control, and enhanced intrinsic motivation. Following this discussion, the six-unit workbook used by students enrolled in the course is presented. In the workbook, sequential units provide information and exercises which require students to: (1) familiarize themselves with college services in the areas of advisement, financial aid, career planning, counseling, library resources, and job placement; (2) assess their academic skills and weaknesses; (3) learn to allocate their time effectively; (4) articulate their expectations of the college and their tentative career choices; (5) delineate their educational goals; (6) establish a plan to achieve those goals; (7) select relevant courses; and (8) develop a tentative schedule for the following quarter. (JP)

Using multilevel models of children in birth census tracts, we examine how early childhood program sequences are associated with kindergarten readiness in Baltimore in 2014. Enrolling in Head Start for two years is associated with higher levels of kindergarten readiness and school attendance, and children who enroll in Pre-K or Head Start followed by Pre-K are the most likely to be kindergarten ready and attend school. The small number of children who enroll in Head Start for one year as a three-year-old followed by no program enrollment as a four-year-old appear to derive no benefit from the experience. The targeted curricular approach adopted by the Pre-K program are associated with higher levels of school readiness, especially in Mathematics and Language & Literacy. Mother's education is strongly associated with both kindergarten readiness and attendance among the children with no program experience. The greatest differences are observed among children whose mothers reported low levels of education, suggesting that early childhood education may mitigate the intergenerational reproduction of educational inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]