Dual/Concurrent Enrollment

[Connections]

If your students take dual or concurrent enrollment at the local junior college and the college dictates that a full credit of high school is awarded, is it OK for your students to take less classes each semester? 

 

We are looking at combining AP and dual enrollment. I was thinking that he would do two year-long AP classes online and 4 classes at the junior college, two each semester. Is that sufficient or does he need to do 4 classes each semester at the junior college? 

 

 

 

 

 

[Matryoshka]

If your students take dual or concurrent enrollment at the local junior college and the college dictates that a full credit of high school is awarded, is it OK for your students to take less classes each semester? 

 

We are looking at combining AP and dual enrollment. I was thinking that he would do two year-long AP classes online and 4 classes at the junior college, two each semester. Is that sufficient or does he need to do 4 classes each semester at the junior college? 

 

Two each semester would be fine.  

[regentrude]

Sufficient. 4 college classes each semester would be a full college load and would be the equivalent of 8 high school credits; additional credits at home would make the course load extremely heavy.

 

ETA: Many colleges would not allow DE students to take  full load.

Edited October 7, 2016 by regentrude

[teachermom2834]

If your students take dual or concurrent enrollment at the local junior college and the college dictates that a full credit of high school is awarded, is it OK for your students to take less classes each semester?

 

We are looking at combining AP and dual enrollment. I was thinking that he would do two year-long AP classes online and 4 classes at the junior college, two each semester. Is that sufficient or does he need to do 4 classes each semester at the junior college?

That is what my ds did his junior year. 2 online AP plus 2 each semester at the community college. He was very busy!

 

Next ds is a less motivated student and taking two DE classes each semester at local university plus 2 non-AP home courses plus working 20+ hours at a part time job.

 

Your plan sounds good to me. 4 college courses each semester would be heavy. To add 2 AP on top would be killer in my opinion.

[workingmom]

DS has been taking DE classes for two years. He started out just taking one DE class (5 credit chem with lab) and one of his high school classes taken at the local public school (engineering) was also dual accredited for 2 credits. This year two of his high school classes that he takes at the public school are both dual credited and then he's taking an eng com directly at the community college. I purposely had him pick an easier 4th class online because the work is sometimes a lot with the DE classes.

 

PP is correct that actually cc don't push for full semesters as DE

[Pegasus]

Definitely sufficient.  DD took 3 dual enrollment courses per semester her senior year and no additional courses at home. 

[zaichiki]

I don't know what your student should do, but here are some examples of other experiences. My ds attends a brick-n-mortar public STEM high school that is on the campus of a university.  By senior year, many of the kids there take classes at the university.  Each class they take at the university replaces one they would have taken at the high school (often math and science), so there's a one to one correspondence.  They don't have many AP classes at his high school, but they do have university classes (from another university) taught AT the high school (the teachers are certified by the university, teaching university syllabi, and the students get credit/transcripts from the university). Right now, as a senior, my ds is taking one math class at the university, one college English class at the high school (as described above), honors physics, honors Spanish, honors international relations, gym, and art. He has friends taking their math, English, and science classes at the university and language, international relations, gym, and art at the high school.  Many of these kids are applying to schools of engineering/college right now (so that tells you about age and type of pool). Hope this helps.

[MarkT]

I don't know what your student should do, but here are some examples of other experiences. My ds attends a brick-n-mortar public STEM high school that is on the campus of a university.  By senior year, many of the kids there take classes at the university.  Each class they take at the university replaces one they would have taken at the high school (often math and science), so there's a one to one correspondence.  They don't have many AP classes at his high school, but they do have university classes (from another university) taught AT the high school (the teachers are certified by the university, teaching university syllabi, and the students get credit/transcripts from the university). Right now, as a senior, my ds is taking one math class at the university, one college English class at the high school (as described above), honors physics, honors Spanish, honors international relations, gym, and art. He has friends taking their math, English, and science classes at the university and language, international relations, gym, and art at the high school.  Many of these kids are applying to schools of engineering/college right now (so that tells you about age and type of pool). Hope this helps.

Just curious - are the university classes taught over a semester (15-16 weeks) or over the school year (30-32 weeks)?

[zaichiki]

Just curious - are the university classes taught over a semester (15-16 weeks) or over the school year (30-32 weeks)?

The classes taken at the university are typical university, semester-length classes.

[quark]

The classes taken at the university are typical university, semester-length classes.

 

That is a fascinating arrangement.

 

Are the other classes year-long classes? Therefore, in your DS's case, he is taking 7 courses one semester and the following semester, the second half of 6 of those courses?

 

[zaichiki]

That is a fascinating arrangement.

 

Are the other classes year-long classes? Therefore, in your DS's case, he is taking 7 courses one semester and the following semester, the second half of 6 of those courses?

 

In my ds's case, he's taking Calc I on the university campus this semester and Calc II next semester. 

 

Last year he took two of the other college's classes at his high school: Marine Science and US History. They were year-long classes.  The English course will be the same this year.  I understand that each class of this type earns him the credit equivalent of a similar semester-long class on the university campus. A brief online search shows that the U of Pittsburg, U of Minnesota, and U of Central Arkansas(?) have this arrangement with a number of high schools.  I bet other universities in the US run these programs at high schools as well.  I believe they are often described as "concurrent enrollment courses" or "early college programs" by the universities.

 

Ds also took a couple of year-long engineering courses through Project Lead the Way and has credits/a transcript from a third local university.

 

... and now I have to get all of these transcripts to the colleges he's applying to next month!  Ack!

 

Edited to add: He took *three* concurrent courses last year: Marine Science, US History, and American Studies (a multi-disciplinary course in writing/literature/US cultures). Not that the number of courses he took last year matters to anyone but him... Editing only for accuracy's sake.  Anyway, along with the three year-long concurrent courses, he also took honors Chemistry, honors Calculus I, honors Spanish II, and gym.

Edited October 17, 2016 by zaichiki

[zaichiki]

http://www.nacep.org/

 

a link about concurrent enrollment programs from the national accrediting body

 

Aha!  Here's the list of colleges that offer this opportunity! http://nacep.org/docs/accreditation/NACEPAccreditedPrograms.pdf

In my son's case, the university that offers these classes at his high school is ranked really well by US News and World Report (and there are a few similar schools on the list). It does look like a number of these are community colleges, though.

 

Edited October 14, 2016 by zaichiki

[Guest]

In my area, the high school treats it as one semester is a half credit. I suspect that is because few are taking a lab based science that has calc as a pre or co req, and those that are taking math are math brains. The gen ed humanities here work well with that plan...students that run into difficulties usually are not reading or writing on a college level, and dont have the math mastery to make econ easy. So, they get bogged down in the readings and papers have them burning the midnight oil. Keep in mind its expected that a high schooler have 10 min x grade level devoted to study, in addition to a study hall and not wasting class time.

 

So, the kid taking DE Calc 1 at the high school over two semesters gets 1 high school credit, while the kid taking DE Calc 1 in one semester gets 0.5 high school credits. This is viewed as fair, because they are working at the level appropriate to them and seat time rules in high school. Same deal as Algebra in a year or over two years....one credit for the former, two for the latter. The university may do it differently....an accelerated course may be less credit than the equivalent two unaccel courses.

 

We also found that a good AP Physics 1 course requires much more time than the same course DE at the CC here. The CC covers less, and in less depth. They have not shifted to concept based as AP did, and the student can easily get an A with little study. The labs at the CC did not require the quality lab reports that the AP course did. My son that did AP was well prepared for U. My son that did CC had to find a TA that could take him to college level with the lab reports, his U assumed that was taught in honors/AP science.

Edited October 14, 2016 by Heigh Ho

[MarkT]

http://www.nacep.org/

 

a link about concurrent enrollment programs from the national accrediting body

 

Aha!  Here's the list of colleges that offer this opportunity! http://nacep.org/docs/accreditation/NACEPAccreditedPrograms.pdf

In my son's case, the university that offers these classes at his high school is ranked really well by US News and World Report (and there are a few similar schools on the list). It does look like a number of these are community colleges, though.

unfortunately the list is tiny versus the number of locations (city) with at least one college.

[melmichigan]

In my area, the high school treats it as one semester is a half credit. I suspect that is because few are taking a lab based science that has calc as a pre or co req, and those that are taking math are math brains. The gen ed humanities here work well with that plan...students that run into difficulties usually are not reading or writing on a college level, and dont have the math mastery to make econ easy. So, they get bogged down in the readings and papers have them burning the midnight oil. Keep in mind its expected that a high schooler have 10 min x grade level devoted to study, in addition to a study hall and not wasting class time.

 

So, the kid taking DE Calc 1 at the high school over two semesters gets 1 high school credit, while the kid taking DE Calc 1 in one semester gets 0.5 high school credits. This is viewed as fair, because they are working at the level appropriate to them and seat time rules in high school. Same deal as Algebra in a year or over two years....one credit for the former, two for the latter. The university may do it differently....an accelerated course may be less credit than the equivalent two unaccel courses.

 

We also found that a good AP Physics 1 course requires much more time than the same course DE at the CC here. The CC covers less, and in less depth. They have not shifted to concept based as AP did, and the student can easily get an A with little study. The labs at the CC did not require the quality lab reports that the AP course did. My son that did AP was well prepared for U. My son that did CC had to find a TA that could take him to college level with the lab reports, his U assumed that was taught in honors/AP science.

In our area it is based on seat time as well.  My DD is attending the middle college, (but the same is for dual enrollment classes) her credits are based on seat time alone.  This semester she took 3 college classes, and is required to take 3 classes in our homeschool.  If she were in the public school she would have been able to take 2 college classes, and required to take 4 classes at her partner high school.