In spite of a plan to greatly reduce the number of California State University freshmen needing remedial classes, more than half of the incoming students needed the classes this year. The state university system didn't create the problem, but it's inherited it. We think the CSU plan to identify academic weaknesses earlier in high school is a good way to jump-start student preparedness.

In 1998, the 23-campus CSU system began charting student proficiency in an effort to reduce the need for remedial classes. It set a goal that by 2007 only 10 percent of students would need the classes.

Based on the progress so far, however, it won't meet the goal. According to placement tests this fall, 37 percent of the freshmen needed remedial classes in math; 48 percent needed the classes in English and 58 percent needed remedial classes in math, English or both subjects.

Those numbers were about the same as last year when 59 percent of the freshmen needed remedial classes, with about the same percentage as this year needing help in math, English or both.

The good news is that once students take the remedial classes, which comprise about a year's worth of study, they graduate at the same rates as the students who entered better prepared. Still, it means both student and university are spending time and resources on subjects that should be mastered in high school.

Trustee Shailesh Mehta expressed the board's frustration when she said she is trying to understand the system's responsibility. "We're spending money on this program and not seeing any percentage improvement year over year. I'm trying to understand the investment we're making."

The problem is what the students are learning and not learning before they get to the CSU campuses. The average high school grade point average of the students needing remedial classes was a 3.2. They were getting better than a B but not learning enough to be prepared for college level classes. Clearly their high school classes are inadequate.

In the case of math, educators blame the lag between the time the students took high school math classes and took the college placement test; they may have forgotten the formulas without practice. Still, we wonder how thoroughly the students are learning math subjects if they forget so much of what they learned in a few months.

The findings that so many CSU freshmen are unprepared are just another example of what we've known for some time. California public schools are failing a large number of our students.

State university officials are developing an assessment test for high school juniors so they will get an idea of what they need to work on when they still have another year of high school. It makes sense to identify students' weaknesses earlier so they can be addressed earlier. We only hope the high schools are capable of meeting the students' academic needs once they have been identified.