Can Dual Enrollment Prevent Your Child from Being Admitted to a Florida University?
Dual enrollment programs allow advanced high school students to complete their first two years of college while still enrolled in high school. Typically, high school students who complete the credits for an Associate in Arts degree at Florida public community colleges should be commended for their hard work and motivation. Dual enrollment is a huge financial bonus to parents who can receive up to two years of college free. In addition, students who are motivated by good grades and achievement get a big boost in self-esteem and confidence, knowing that they have what it takes to complete college level work sooner than the majority of their peers. Their parents are proud of them, too.
How can a program that offers such obvious advantages work against these bright, hard working students? It happens all too often. Just yesterday I met with another anxious parent and his academically talented son. The student had good test scores, and had completed his A.A. degree at a Florida public community college. No doubt he pressed the “submit” button on his electronic application confident that he would be receiving an acceptance letter soon. What he received instead was an unpleasant surprise informing him that he was not admitted to the university of his choice. Although he was later re-evaluated as a freshman, he did not quite make that cut. Instead of celebrating, this family is now on the road visiting university administrators trying to understand what went wrong. And trying late in the game to find a university for their son to attend in the fall.
This is hardly an isolated incident. What this parent and student did not know is that students who receive the A.A. degree (in Florida) can be considered by state university admissions offices as transfer students. Transfer students are admitted under a different set of rules, governed in part by the Articulation Agreement regulated by Florida Statute. These students are considered to be juniors rather than freshmen. (Well, that was part of the attraction of the Dual Enrollment program wasn’t it? “When Susie enrolls at XYZ University, she’ll be a junior and way ahead of the freshman class.“)
As juniors, transfer students are usually required to have completed specific prerequisite course work in their first two years of college. When a high school student completes his A.A. degree, he must also have all those prerequisite courses complete, often with specific grades, in order to gain admission. A lot of surprised and disappointed students ask, “Can’t I just take the courses here?” The answer is, “No.”
Universities are expected to award bachelor’s degrees within a reasonable number of credit hours. A student with 60 hours of college credit that does not apply to his intended degree program can find the door permanently closed. Applying for a different major and then trying to switch once enrolling at the university is not an option. Either the courses are complete within the first 60 hours, or they are not.
Parents with students in Dual Enrollment programs must understand that by completing an A.A. degree in high school, students may be deprived of the opportunity to “explore” majors at the university level. They will have completed all of their General Education requirements (the courses often used to dabble in potentially interesting academic subjects) and they will be expected to begin junior level course work specific to their declared major. If they apply to a highly structured program, such as architecture, business, engineering, math, or science (think pre-med), the necessary sequencing of courses might keep them from a full-time course load in their major. They will then have to enroll in additional “excess” hours required to be full-time students so that they can maintain scholarships, or health insurance, or other important things like football tickets and access to other university resources. To complicate matters further, professional schools don’t weight these courses as highly as “equivalent” courses taken at the university level. These excess hours cost money and also dampen that dream of completing a Bachelor’s degree in two years.
Please don’t think that I don’t support Dual Enrollment programs. I do support them. They have many advantages to both student and parent. But the truth is that completing the A.A. degree works best for a very specific group of students: those who know without a doubt what they will major in.
It’s a lot to ask a 16 year old Dual Enrollment student what he or she wants to study in college. It’s like taking them to a restaurant and asking them what they want to eat before showing them the menu. There are some people, though, who seem to be born knowing what they want to do for the rest of their lives. These are the students I believe are best suited to Dual Enrollment. These are the students who will do the research on majors, complete what they must complete, and sail through their university programs to their intended degree without ever wondering if another major might have been better for them. If this describes your child, get in touch with the university of choice, find out what is needed to “transfer”, and read the college catalog carefully. Keep a careful log of contacts and what was discussed. You can stop reading this article now.
If you are not absolutely certain that your student is in this category, but you are determined to complete the A.A. degree, then you and your student must start researching programs of study immediately. Talk to each university under consideration. Talk to advisors in every college that houses a program your child might want. Fully understand what must be completed within Dual Enrollment to ensure admission to the university and college of choice. If your student is not absolutely certain about his academic goals, then it could be in his best interest not to complete the A.A. degree.
It should be noted that some universities will evaluate these students as freshmen, as well as transfer students. Still, they have to make that “freshman cut” and there are no guarantees.
This article will not make me popular with my friends in the community colleges, although I am a truly big proponent of Florida’s community colleges. I have spent the past 18 years promoting them, and I have a degree from one of them. They are wonderful institutions, and Florida has a community college to university system that sets a standard for the rest of the country.
With that said, it is still every parent’s and student’s responsibility to fully understand the complete path of their college program. Starting to look into colleges in the early part of senior year is too late for Dual Enrollment students (and everyone else, really). Dual Enrollment students are starting college now. It is up to you to do the research, to contact universities, and make certain that the first year of Dual Enrollment – the year that will be the actual freshman year – is planned in accordance with the requirements for your program.
You won’t be disappointed if you do the homework now.
