Cooperative learning is a structured, systematic instructional strategy in which small groups of students work together toward a common goal. Cooperative learning may be considered a subset of collaborative learning. Collaborative learning tends to encompass a variety of group learning experiences, such as peer tutoring, student-faculty research projects, short-term buzz groups, learning communities, and other techniques. This chapter gives the reader a brief overview of the major issues and concerns that instructors should consider in deciding whether to use cooperative learning in their courses. More detailed discussions of the issues described in each section may be obtained from the sources cited at the end of the chapter. 

 

           Most forms of small-group instruction on students' attitudes (Slavin, 1983). However, certain element of small-group instruction must be in place to ensure consistent effects on achievement. Two critical features often distinguish cooperative learning from other forms of small-group instruction: positive interdependence and individual accountability Positive interdependence is essential to fostering significant achievement gains. Structures must be built into the learning environment to ensure that all members of a cooperative-learning team feel a sense of responsibility for their teammates. One way to promote this sense of responsibility is by providing materials that must be shared (materials interdependence). Another way to foster group cohesion is by assigning different members of each team a discrete amount of material to master and then share with teammates (task interdependence). Finally, a small part of each person's grade can depend on each member of the team improving his or her performance on exams (goal interdependence). 

           A common complaint among those who use small-group instructional procedures is the inequitable distribution of work load across group participants. This problem is usually caused by giving students undifferentiated group grades for papers, presentations, and other course assignments. To combat this phenomenon, the second feature that often distinguishes cooperative learning from other collaborative-learning techniques is the insistence on individual accountability in grading. Even though students work together in teams for some percentage of the in-class or out-of-class work, course grades are almost always exclusively determined by individually completed tests, papers, and other assessment procedures. Individual accountability helps decrease the sense of inequity perceived by many in traditional small-group procedures, where a significant percentage of the course grade is given to all members of a team, even when one or two of the team members have done most of the work. Forms of small-group instruction that do not contain the two features just describe: should be termed collaborative learning, not cooperative learning 

           Four additional features are always characteristic of cooperative learning and are often used in other forms of collaborative learning as well. One such feature is appropriate assignment to groups. This grouping is usually heterogeneous in terms of race, sex, prior achievement, and other characteristics deemed appropriate by the instructor. Appropriate assignment of students to cooperative-learning groups promotes improved attitudes toward persons of differing backgrounds, an issue of great concern in dealing with the student diversity that challenges many of our colleges and universities (Johnson and Johnson, 1989). 

           The teacher as coach or facilitator is another characteristic of cooperative and other forms of collaborative learning. Rather than functioning as an expert dispenser of information, as in the lecture format, the teacher is in a more collegial role, structuring the learning environment so that students are more interactive with one another and with the teacher. Students are expected to take more responsibility for their own learning than they would in traditional lecture and lecture/discussion formats. 

           An additional feature of cooperative learning is its explicit attention to social skills. In cooperative learning (and some other forms of collaborative learning) formal structures are designed  to encourage such prosocial behaviors as active listening, cooperation, and respect for others. The simplest structure takes the form of stating certain specific prosocial behaviors as classroom expectations or requirements on the syllabus. A more complex structure is group processing, a technique in which each member of the group evaluates each teammate's behavior on specified criteria and reports his or her perceptions to the teacher or teammates for discussion or grading. 

           Finally, cooperative learning tends to emphasize face-to?face problem solving. Often this problem solving happens immediately after a lecture or reading, allowing students to elaborate on recently acquired information and to transfer this information into long-term memory. Fostering such metacognitive activity is consistent with what psychologists know about encouraging critical thinking and promoting lifelong learning. 

        Each of the six features of cooperative learning should be explicitly addressed by the instructor, no matter which form of small-group instruction is used. 

History and Research 

        The roots of cooperative learning may be traced to John Dewey who emphasized education as a vehicle for teaching citizens to live cooperatively in a social democracy. A second major figure in the history of cooperative learning is social psychologist Kurt Lewin, who in the 1930s and 1940s emphasized the importance of group dynamics in understanding the behavior of leaders and members of democratic groups. Morton Deutsch was a student of Lewin's at MIT who developed a theory of cooperation and competition based on Lewin's "field theory." More recently, David and Roger Johnson at the University of Minnesota, Shlomo Sharan at the University of Tel Aviv, and Robert Slavin at Johns Hopkins have been among the researcher/practitioners helping develop cooperative learning into one of the best-researched pedagogical approaches in education over the last thirty years, although almost all their work has been done in precollegiate settings. 

         In 1989 Johnson and Johnson surveyed 193 studies in which cooperative learning was compared to more traditional forms of instruction, using group productivity as an outcome measure. In over 50 percent of the cases, the cooperative-learning approach was more effective than more traditional forms of instruction, while in 10 percent of the cases, competitive or individualistic approaches to instruction produced higher productivity. Regarding attitudes toward other people, Johnson and Johnson (1989) found that the cooperative-learning approach produced greater interpersonal attraction in 60 percent of the comparisons and that competitive and individualistic approaches produced higher levels of interpersonal attraction in 3 percent of the cases. 

           Earlier the Johnson's and their colleagues (1981) published a meta-analysis of 122 studies of cooperative learning using academic achievement as the outcome measure. They found cooperation to be much more powerful in producing achievement than the other interaction patterns, and the results held for several subject areas and a range of age groups from elementary school through adult. These general findings have been replicated by a number of researchers looking at a variety of cognitive and attitudinal measures (Johnson and Johnson, 1989; Slavin, 1983). Analyses of cooperative-learning's effect on critical thinking, self-esteem, racial/ethnic relations, prosocial behavior, and a variety of other measures have consistently demonstrated that cooperative learning is superior to more traditional forms of instruction in a majority of the cases and is rarely inferior to other forms of instruction. In other words, while cooperative learning is not always superior to other instructional approaches, it rarely has detrimental effects on student outcomes. 

           Unfortunately, relatively few well-controlled studies of cooperative learning have been conducted at the college level. In 1992 Smith and Conrad found 171 citations in the ERIC data base under the descriptor "Cooperative Learning and Higher Education." Almost all of these citations date from 1988 to 1992. Most were reports of practical applications of cooperative learning to specific disciplines rather than empirical comparisons of cooperative learning to other pedagogical approaches. However, Frierson (1986) found that nursing students at a predominantly black college who studied cooperatively for their state licensing exams passed their exams at a significantly higher rate than comparable students studying individually. Treisman (1986) found that African American students at the University of California, Berkeley, who worked cooperatively in enrichment sessions outside of class received calculus course grades over one letter grade higher than comparable African American students who did not use the enrichment programs. College attrition rates for African-American students not involved In the year-long program matched the Berkeley average for all students and were significantly lower for program participants than for comparable African-American students? not involved in the program. 

           Cooper and Mueck (1990) reported on over 1,000 students in cooperatively taught courses in nine different disciplines at a predominately minority, urban comprehensive university. Students were asked to compare their cooperative-learning experiences with their experiences in courses taught using more traditional lecture and lecture/discussion classes. From 70 to 90 percent rated their cooperative-learning experience as somewhat or significantly more positive on such variables as academic achievement, higher-level thinking skills, interest in subject matter, likelihood of attending class, time on task, ability to diagnose own knowledge of subject matter, amount of class time required to reach mastery, general class morale, and rapport with the teacher. Two of the highest-rated dimensions on the anonymously completed student evaluations were frequency quality of student-student interactions and frequency and quality of student-teacher interactions. 

           Astin (1992) recently completed a study of over 200 colleges and universities to assess what factors make a difference in undergraduate education. After examining nearly 200 environmental variables, including a large number of curriculum factors, he concluded that student-student interaction and student-teacher interaction were by far the best predictors of positive student cognitive and attitudinal changes in the undergraduate experience. Curriculum arrangements seemed to have little effect on student outcomes. Based on this and related research, Astin has pressed for greater use of cooperative learning  in college  instruction. 

           According to Kagan (1992), there are over fifty forms of cooperative learning. Each has its appropriate application depending on the nature of the student population and the type of educational outcome to be fostered. Ultimately, each teacher must decide which of the cooperative-learning techniques to use and the relative amount of total in-class and out-of-class time devoted to cooperative learning. Listed here is a sampling of the forms of cooperative learning that have received the most empirical attention, beginning with the more teacher-centered moving to more student-centered approaches. 

           1. STAD (student teams achievement division). In this cooperative-learning technique, students receive information via lectures, films, readings, and so on, and then receive a worksheet to complete in teams of four. The teams, formed by the teaches are typically heterogeneous, based on prior achievement, race, sex, language background, and other factors determined by instructor. The worksheets may contain case studies, problems to solve, or other tasks. Once all members have agreed that have completed the task and mastered the skills assessed by worksheet, the instructor is called over. In addition to verbally quizzing individual team members on how the worksheet problems were solved, the instructor may give one or all members of the team a quiz that must be completed individually by team members (individual accountability). The team is excused if individual mastery of the content is assured. This is one the most teacher-centered of the cooperative-learning techniques as the instructor often determines the members of individual teams and their roles within the teams, the nature of the learning materials, and most other elements of the instructional sequence. 

           2. Jigsaw. With this technique, the teacher assigns a different minitopic to each member of a team. The students research their assigned minitopics, then meet in expert groups with members of other teams assigned the same minitopic to discuss refine their understanding of the subject. Team members return to their original groups to teach the minitopics to the entire team.

           3. Constructive controversy (structured controversy).   Pairs within a four-person team are assigned different sides of an issue. Each pair researches one side of the topic (or a summary is provided by the teacher). The two pairs discuss the topic, not to win a debate but to adduce as much information on the topic as possible. Pairs then switch sides and develop arguments for the opposite side of the same issue. 

           4. Group investigation.  Students are given great freedom in determining how to organize their teams, conduct the research, and present their ideas to the total class. Often the class presentation is a brief play, a video or slide show, a demonstration, or some other type of performance. Even with this student-centered form of cooperative learning, however, the instructor grades the individual's contribution to the team project to prevent the dominator/freeloader phenomenon. 

Instructors may mix and match these and the several dozen other types of cooperative learning (see Kagan, 1992; Johnson, Johnson and Smith, 1991, for complete descriptions of many cooperative-learning procedures). It is possible to modify the techniques for different student populations and academic disciplines. Note however, that all cooperative-learning techniques must have the following features for most effective implementation: (1) a clear specification of the instructional goal or objective, (2) group work designed to promote some attitude, to teach something, or to give practice in performing a task, and (3) some form of individual student assessment to determine 

Fitting Cooperative Learning 

           Susan Prescott of California State University, Dominguez Hills, has found that it is possible to begin experimenting with cooperative learning without implementing formal cooperative-learning structures such as jigsaw and STAD. For example, if an instructor primarily uses a lecture format, she may consider adding the following as supplements to her current lesson. Before the lecture, she may establish a motivational hook to focus the students' attention on the content of the lecture. She may then take three to five minutes to pose a question or frame an issue that will be a focal point for the day. The teacher may have teams discuss the issue, take a position, or ask questions relating to the topic. During the lecture, the instructor can stop at critical points to actively involve the students. Research on student attention span suggests that breaking up the lecture every fifteen to twenty minutes will result in much higher time-on-task among students. For example, the professor might stop after fifteen minutes of lecturing on fairly technical information and ask pairs or teams of students to find an example of the concept(s) just presented or ask a question relating to the topic. (Refer to Chapter Three for excellent guidelines on sequencing examples.)  A teacher might create an intentional error in a problem based on the fifteen-minute lecture and ask the groups to identify it.  If the lecture has been procedural, students might be asked to compare notes to ensure that all procedural steps are understood by all students. Such breaks in the lecture need only take one to five minutes. 

           After the lecture, the instructor might organize a somewhat longer task to help students consolidate or practice the information just presented. Students can be asked to return to the questions they formulated at the start of the class and attempt to answer them. These questions and answers might be shared with individual teammates or with the entire class if time permits. Students might be asked to create a set of hypothetical test questions based on the lecture and then share those questions with the entire class. The instructor might even promise to use a sample of the test items created in class on actual tests.  Teams may be asked to create compare/contrast charts, write explanatory captions of pictures given to them, or create a dialogue for a character in a play, film, or novel. Teams may simply be asked to solve a set of problems from a worksheet based on the content of the lecture. Many teachers have found that something as simple as a previously used test or an exercise from an instructor's textbook manual can provide highly interactive, tied to metacognitive practice for students. 

           Activities such as those just described for enrichment of the lecture can be constructed for instructors who commonly use discussion methods and audio-visual materials. Cooperative learning activities can also be used before and after homework assignments.  Prescott (1990) describes these technique in more detail in the Cooperative Learning and College Teaching newsletter. 

           Based on eight years of experience implementing cooperative learning at California State University, Dominguez Hills, and on conversations with practitioners around the country, we would like to offer the following tips to faculty who are considering use of cooperative learning in their classes. 

           1. Start small.   Use cooperative learning in the class that you feel most confident about. If you do so, you will have a better handle on the key points within the course that should serve as the focal points for cooperative learning activities. Also, if one of the cooperative learning activities fails or is completed in one-third of the anticipated class time, you will be able to say, "Good, that gives us time to preview the next unit of instruction." One surefire way to use cooperative learning is t, review for a test. Cooper uses STAD to review for each unit test, and students commonly stay after the class to ask for additional sample problems and worksheets used during the review 

           2. Use cooperative learning with criterion-referenced grading.  Norm-referenced grading (grading on the curve) often explicitly: encourages excessive competition for scarce resources (A's and B's). Almost all cooperative learning practitioners suggest absolute grading criteria in which all who achieve the pre-stated standard for a specific grade receive the commensurate grade. 

           3. Make cooperative learning a small dart of the total grade. One instructor gives three bonus points for successful completion of twelve cooperative learning activities in his semester-long research methods class. If the cooperative learning activities are tied to important course objectives and help the students master individually completed tests and papers, little of the course grade need be tied to successful cooperative learning work. A few bonus points are enough to reward the students in these intrinsically motivating cooperative learning tasks. 

           4. Introduce the technique well. Clearly identify your rationale for using the technique. Indicate that there is a substantial research base for your experimenting with the technique. Clearly identify that, unlike other small-group techniques students may have experienced, course grades will depend almost entirely on individually graded tests and papers. In other words, if students help one another, they will not be putting their own grade in jeopardy. 

           5. Structure the cooperative learning activities so that students must, learn something, not do something.  If students know that they can complete a worksheet, then leave, that is what many will do. Develop a method to assess mastery of the content independent of the group work (such as individually completed quizzes) and communicate  the ethic that the teamís work is never done until all members have mastered the skills that underlie the cooperative learning activity. 

           One technique used to reinforce the positive interdependence notion described earlier and to emphasize content mastery for all students is to give a one-minute quiz over the content for of the worksheet. All students must pass the quiz at a high standard of mastery (often 100 percent) before any student may leave. Or, the instructor might have a randomly selected student take the brief quiz for all members of the team.  If students fail to meet mastery, their teammates reteach the necessary skills 

            Then another quiz is administered. 

            6. Clarity and organization are essential.  When asked to name the main cause of small-group failure, most teachers respond that students were not clear as to what the task was and how they should proceed in completing the assignment. At least initially, cooperative learning group tasks should be structured by the teacher. Students are less anxious about course content and grading when expectations are clearly delineated.  This is true of all instructional approaches  but is especially true in small-group work. Such structure may include specifying roles for each team member, setting time limits for each element of the task, making suggestions for getting started, describing what the final product for the day might look like, and so on.  As students experience success and gain confidence in their abilities to work in teams, student control of many of these decisions may replace teacher control (Cooper and others, 1990). 

           Many instructors are dissatisfied with their current teaching techniques, which they usually identify as lecture or lecture/discussion. Research by Karp and Yoels (1987) indicates that even in classes identified as discussion, three to five students dominate the discussion with the teacher. Thus, most teaching is characterized by a high degree of teacher control and student passivity and powerlessness. This creates an environment in which the teacher feels compelled to intellectually move the class from one level of skill to another. This burden of feeling totally responsible for such a daunting task is sometimes termed the Atlas complex. In cooperative learning, much of the responsibility for learning is explicitly placed on the student. However, handing over some of this control is a difficult change for many instructors to make. That is why we suggest that the change to cooperative learning be done in stages (see Implementation Tips). 

            Many instructors voice legitimate concerns or objections about adapting cooperative learning in their classrooms. Here are the most common: 

           1. "I can't cover as much content in my lectures."   It is certainly true that time spent in cooperative learning groups is time away from the lecture.  Many of us feel that we already have too much content to teach in the forty to forty-five contact hours per term available in many courses. However, the information in our disciplines is only going to increase in amount and complexity.  Because we cannot teach everything in any discipline, we must start teaching a more limited number of overarching concepts with wide-ranging applicability. Thus, we are covering less content via the lecture in our cooperative learning-taught classes.  However, the retention rates for material that is presented in lecture and practiced in small groups is increased substantially.  Courses taught using cooperative learning result in content being learned at a higher level of mastery and being retained longer relative to the case with more traditionally taught classes. Thus, the content is available for generalizing to new situations because it has been modeled, discussed, and critiqued in highly interactive small groups. Compare this cooperative form of learning difficult material with a more traditional procedure in which the student hears a lecture on a given topic, then memorizes as much of this content as possible for an exam given several weeks after the lecture (Johnson and Johnson, 1989). 

           2. "I don't have time to prepare cooperative learning activities. " The first time an instructor converts a course to include cooperative learning activities, there is an additional time commitment involved. However, the power of cooperative learning is such that students become highly involved, even in such easily accessible material as old exams, exercises from instructor or Student manuals, and simple problem sets. The pleasure of watching students actively engage in solving the problems is so exciting that it makes whatever additional time is required for preparation seem like time well spent. Once the instructor becomes more skilled at identifying the major concepts within his or her courses, and observing what works and what doesn't in small groups, he or she becomes more interested in constructing materials that are more challenging, more exciting, and more tightly linked to his or her own course goals. 

           3. "What happens when some people work and others don't?"   This objection is partially handled by making students individually accountable. Almost all the course grade in cooperative learning courses is still determined by individually completed tests, papers, and so on. To deal with a sandbagger who will not contribute, we suggest keeping close tabs on groups as they work.  During cooperative learning class time, the instructor should remain in the classroom, moving from team to team, monitor?ing group progress. If there is a noncontributing group member, the instructor may take that person aside, outside of class, and attempt to remedy the problem. Failing this, the instructor may intervene within the group setting. Only if a student repeatedly and intentionally refuses to contribute to the group would we recommend dismissal from the group. This rarely happens, especially if the teacher states on the first day of the class and in the syllabus that all students are expected to participate in group activities. 

Conclusion: The Future of Cooperative

           One can scarcely pick up a newspaper without reading another indictment of college teaching and learning. These reports (Association of American Colleges, 1985; Bok, 1986; Boyer, 1987; National Institute of Education, 1984) decry excessive passivity in the current teaching/learning process and call for greater involvement of students in their own learning. 

Cooperative learning is a pedagogy with a record of over twenty-five years of success at the K-12 level. One task for re?search in higher education over the next decade should be to relate the efficacy of cooperative learning to the college classroom.  Can the powerful effect of cooperative learning seen hundreds of K-12 studies be replicated with college students?  Research on the characteristics of college students and adult learners suggests that well-conceived cooperative learning techniques should be effective. If cooperative learning has a generally positive effect on achievement in the college classroom, is this effect differential?  That is, does it work particularly well for some disciplines and courses?  Does it work particularly well for certain types of students?  Precollegiate research suggests that the answer to these questions may be yes. Perhaps cooperative, learning is particularly useful for the at-risk student or for the student whose cultural background emphasizes cooperation rather than competition. With its emphasis on highly involving, informal contacts among students and between students and teachers, does cooperative learning have potential as a relatively cheap retention device, since it incorporates many of the dimensions recommended by leading retention researchers such as Noel and Tinto? 

Research undertaken by Cooper and his colleagues at California State University, Dominguez Hills, is attempting to address several of these issues. They are looking at the effect of cooperative learning on a variety of outcomes measures, including Perry's "stages" of cognitive development, attrition in college, critical thinking, and other cognitive and attitudinal measures. More than 1,300 students taught in over thirty sections of undergraduate courses are serving as subjects for this study.  Tinto and his colleagues at the National Center on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning, and Assessment (at Pennsylvania State University) are looking at the effects of cooperative learning and collaborative learning on a number of outcome measures. Smith and MacGregor at Evergreen State College have been exploring the impact of collaborative learning on various outcome measures for several years. David and Roger Johnson and Karl Smith at the University of Minnesota have recently expanded their study on the effects of cooperative learning on precollegiate populations to include college-level application.  However, the classroom teacher may not wish to wait the years it will take to develop unambiguous answers to the questions and issues described above. The data at both K ? 12 and college level indicate that cooperative learning is generally more effective than more traditional forms of instruction and is rarely less effective. In light of the importance of teamwork and cooperation in our society and the lack of instruction concerning these values in our current higher-education systems, some amount of cooperative learning instruction seems justified even if it is found to have relatively little impact on achievement, critical thinking, or other cognitive outcomes. 

            Many professional accrediting groups are calling for a commitment to teaching such values in their disciplines (including accounting, a discipline that is often unfairly stereotyped as being individualistic and competitive). The continuing unrest in our cities is a clear symptom that we, as a society, have a long way to go in meeting Dewey's goal of preparing our citizenry to function cooperatively in a social democracy. 

The following list of persons and groups doing work in cooper?ative learning and collaborative learning comes from Collaborative Learning:  A Sourcebook for Higher Education. This book can be purchased for $23 by contacting the National Center on Postsecondary Teaching, Learning, and Assessment, Pennsylvania State University, 403 South Allen St., Suite 104, University Park, PA 16801-5252, 814-865-5917, FAX 814-865-3638,. 

            Network for Cooperative Learning in Higher Education 

Those  wishing to find out more about cooperative learning in higher education may contact this network, which was started by Cooper and funded by a grant from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE). In addition to sponsoring research on cooperative learning in higher education, the California State University, Dominguez Hills, program has a dissemination strand. Among the materials avail able from the network are articles and bibliographies concerning cooperative learning and college teaching. Many chapter in the bibliographies deal with discipline-specific application of cooperative learning. The network also produces a newsletter published by New Forum Press that deals with applications of cooperative learning to higher education. In addition, Jim Cooper and his associates have written a fifty-five-page workbook on cooperative learning in the college classroom that can be purchased for $14 by contacting the California State University Foundation, California State University Institute for Teaching and Learning, Office of the Chancellor, 400 Golden Shore. Long Beach, CA 90802-4275. For materials on cooperative learning in higher education contact Jim Cooper, California State University, Dominguez Hills, HFA-B-316, 1000 E. Victoria St., 

Carson, CA 90747 , 310?516?3961 . 

Collaboration in Undergraduate Education (CUE) Collaborative and Cooperative Learning Network

This network organizes the Collaborative Learning Action Community of the American Association for Higher Education (AAHE) and is a part of the National Collegiate Honors Council. Since 1983 CUE has sponsored various conferences and publications to promote the use of collaborative learning in undergraduate education. A bibliography on collaborative learning and additional information may be obtained by contacting Roberta Matthews, LaGuardia Community College, 31-10  Thompson Ave., Long Island City-NY  11101,  718-582-5443 

Cooperative Learning Center 

The focus of this center is on research in cooperative  learning, the structured use of interdependent team members, and individual accountability. Much of the work has been done at the K-12 level, but in recent years the researchers have turned their attention to cooperative learning at the college level. The center is a resource for materials, teacher training, and workshops on cooperative learning across the country. For more information contact David Johnson or Roger Johnson, University of Min?nesota, 202 Pattee Hall, 150 Pillsbury Dr. SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455, 612-624-7031. The cooperative learning workbook published by Johnson, Johnson, and Smith (1991) can be purchased by contacting the Cooperative Learning Center. 

New England Resource Center for Higher Education

This center serves private and public higher-education institutions within New England. Some of the specific interests and concerns of the center are the development of collaborative relationships within and among colleges and universities in New England, preparation and continuing professional development of administrators and faculty, and incentives for high-quality work. The resource center has a number of ongoing research projects, sponsors, conferences, and seminars for a wide range of professionals in higher education and publishes a newsletter, The Academic Workplace. For inclusion on the mailing list, contact Zelda Gamson, University of Massachusetts, Boston, 

Graduate College of Education, Harbor Campus ? W/2/143,Boston, MA 02125-3393, 617-287-7740, FAX 617-287-7922. 

Washington Center for Improving the Quality of Undergraduate Education 

Established in 1985 as an inter-institutional consortium, the Washington Center focuses on low-cost, high-yield approaches to educational reform, emphasizing better utilization and sharing of existing resources through inter-institutional collaboration. The center, supported by the Washington State Legislature, includes forty-two participating institutions: all of the state's public four-year institutions and community colleges, and nine independent colleges. It supports and coordinates inter-institutional faculty exchanges, the development of interdisciplinary learning community programs, conferences, seminars, and technical assistance on effective approaches to teaching (Washington Center News, 1991). 

            The center publishes the Washington Center News, an outstanding newsletter filled with reports of activities from various institutions in the state. To be included on their mailing list, write or call Barbara Leigh Smith or Jean MacGregor, The Evergreen State College, Olympia, WA 98505, 206-866-6000 ext. 6863. 

Association of American Colleges. Integrity in the Curriculum: A Report to the Academic       Community. (Project on Redefining the Meaning and Purpose of Baccalaureate Degrees.)  Washington, D.C.: Association of American Colleges, 1985. 

Astin, A. W. What Matters in College? Four Critical Years. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1992. 

Bok, D. Higher Learning. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986. 

Boyer, E. L. College: The Undergraduate Experience in York: HarperCollins, 1987. 

Cooper, J., and Mueck, R. "Student Involvement in Learning: Cooperative Learning and College  Instructionî Journal on Excellence in College Teaching, 1990, 1, 68-76. 

Cooper, J., and others. Cooperative Learning and College Instruction: Effective Use of Student   Learning Teams. Long Beach: California State University Institute for Teaching and Learning, 1990. 

Frierson, H. T. ìTwo Intervention Methods: Effects on Groups of Predominantly Black Nursing   Students' Board Scores.î Journal of Educational Psychology, 1986, 69, 101-108. 

Johnson, D. W., and Johnson, R. T. Cooperation and Competition: Theory and Research. Edina, Minn.: Interaction Book, 1989. 

Johnson, D. W., Johnson, R. T., and Smith, K. A. Active Learning: Cooperation in the College    Classroom. Edina, Minn.: Interaction Book, 1991. 

Johnson, D. W., and others.  ì Effects of Cooperative, Competitive, and Individualistic Goal    Structures on  Achievement: A Meta- Analysis.î  Psychological Bulletin, 1981, 89,  47 ? 62. 

Kagan, S. Cooperative Learning. San Juan Capistrano, Calif.: Resources for Teachers, 1992. 

Karp, D., and Yoels, W. ìThe College Classroom: Some Observations on the Meanings of Students'   Participation.î  Sociology and Social Research, 1987, 60, 421-439. 

National Institute for Education. Involvement in Learning. (Study Group on the Conditions of   Excellence in Higher Education.) Washington, D.C.: National Institute for Education, 1984 

Prescott, S. "Fitting Cooperative Learning into Existing Teaching Styles ".  Cooperative Learning and  College Teaching, Dec. 1990, pp. 5-6. 

Slavin, R. E. "When Does Cooperative Learning Increase Student Achievement?"Psychological  Bulletin, 1983, 94(3), 429 ? 445. 

Smith, K., and Conrad, J. "Cooperative Learning: Theory and Practice."The National Teaching and   Learning Forum, 1 (1992): 8-11.

Treisman, P. U. "A Study of the Mathematics Performance of Black Students at the University of    California, Berkeley." Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1986.Washington Center News, Fall 1991, p. 36.