Dual-Credit 'A Key To The Future'

In today’s world, nearly every one interacts with time via a linear application. As a result, students enter education’s linear process at early childhood and move through to junior school, then middle school, followed by senior school, off to college and finally, university. This process is very clean, very tidy and of course very linear. Each step is a reflection of the importance and grandeur of the next, which is revealed through the processes that students must undergo to gain access to the various levels. At the base of this hierarchical pyramid is early childhood while at the apex is the university. The whole focus is about moving up through the system to ensure that as many students as possible can gain access to the holy grail of education: a college or university qualification. Unfortunately, this lock step approach to education, as noted by Spender, “. . . (is) basically a 19 th-century model intended to train willing workers for . . . the industrial era.” (1) Workers trained under this model were, reliable, dependable and diligent and who have been inculcated with a work ethic encouraging them to take orders and fit into a repetitive work environment. (2) However, the order and repetition that was required in the 19 th-century economy has been usurped by the individual creativity and job flexibility of the 21 st-century economy. (3) The 21 st-century economy calls for individuals to take charge, to be creative with ideas and information and these concepts would be considered an anathema to the industrialists of the 19 th-century. What the economy of the 21 st-century requires of individuals is higher order cognitive thinking skills; like critical thinking, evaluation, assessment and not just simply recall. Consequently, it is becoming increasingly evident that this 19 th-century industrial model for education is no longer capable of addressing the needs of students in the 21 st-century. Thankfully, this concern has been recognized by governments and attempts to ameliorate it have commenced.

In the United States, for example, there is now a push in high schools to address the aspirations of gifted and educationally mature students wanting access to a college or university degree course; via an extended high school curriculum. While in Australia elite schools, for students who are of a similar penchant to those described in the US, have been constructed to meet their needs. Hence, education and its impact on the lives of students is fast becoming the focus of concern for a number of academics looking at ways in which to address this predicament. Clearly, government institutions will attempt to deal with this issue constrained by the parameters of their own cultural and economic capabilities. However, no matter what action they select to take, there are two very important issues that must be addressed. First, to maintain the credibility of the educational system and the integrity of the courses through quality control and second, that the projects undertaken are sustainable; in that there is enough capital to facilitate their implementation. Clearly, the parsimonious nature of government and the clear lack of importance placed on education will no doubt ensure that funding will not bountiful. Therefore, it is imperative that any developments must be able to either self fund or facilitate economic savings for both government and individuals. Dr Hans A Andrews in his book The Dual-Credit Phenomenon! - Challenging Secondary School Students Across 50 States (4) examines these two issues by highlighting how institutions can maintain the credibility of their programs and governments are able to sustain the implementation of an education process designed to focus on addressing the needs of their 21 st-century clientele. Andrews’ focus is on moving away from the lock step approach of the current model for education, which is tied to a 19 th-century industrial economic view, to one espousing a much more flexible and creative approach that encourages higher order thinking skills.

Andrews cites Botstein, McCarthy and Conley (5) who noted that the majority of college bound students found their last year of high school was a waste of time. In Andrews’ opinion the,

. . . state of affairs has dramatically changed for high school students during the last years of the 20th Century and leading in to the 21st Century. Enlightened secondary school administrators, community college leaders, and some innovative university people have developed a new and challenging program entitled dual-credit or concurrent enrollments . . . (6)

Andrews emphasized that some confusion existed with respect to a definition of dual-credit or concurrent enrolment as many people interchange the words. However, dual-credit is where a secondary school student enrolls in a college class so that both college credit and credit toward high school graduation are earned. The Dual-Credit Phenomenon deals with fairly concise and tangible issues that are pertinent to high school youth and expresses sound, logical solutions. For example, Time-to-Degree where Andrews argued, “One of the prevailing concerns at the beginning of the 21st Century has been the length of time it takes students to arrive at a baccalaureate degree.”(7) According to Andrews ‘. . . many full-time college students take between 4.5 to 5.5 years to complete their degrees.’ (8) In Illinois, for example, ‘. . . the Affordability Study Committee pushed for options . . . in the secondary schools. . .’ (9) that looked at dual-accreditation programs for students who were academically ready; thereby reducing their time-to-degree. Similarly in other states, like Minnesota and Iowa, students have graduated with College qualifications while at the same time receiving a high school diploma. (10) Coupled with its ability to meet the needs of students the dual-accreditation process also represents a saving for government and individuals. For example,

The state of Washington has analyzed the state’s appropriation saving to be 38 million dollars or more a year in their dual-credit program titled Running Start. This figure increases to 50 million a year saved when the 12 million saved in tuition by parents and students is added to the formula. (11)

With returns like this, it is no wonder that 50 states have introduced dual-credit programs and that across all sections of American society, according to Andrews, individuals are demanding programs that challenge students in a cost effective way. (12) Quite clearly, dual-credit has been a success and the author believes that this success can be linked to four processes that are associated with application of the program.

First, its ability to lock in on students who are either academically gifted or exhibiting an attitude towards education that reflects a maturity level commensurate with a desire to undertake alternative study, so that they can succeed at that level. As Andrews noted,

The importance of this program (dual - credit) is being documented in states where it has existed for several years. It provides exceptional options to secondary schools wanting to offer challenging programs to their honor students as well as to students who need to explore career options and obtain technical and vocational background for the work force. (13)

Second, the rigorous selection processes that students are required to under go before their acceptance into the program. The Tallahassee Community College, for example, did not find it surprising that its high school students were successful in the dual-accreditation program because they had previously been required to pass a college placement test and be recommended by the high school principal before they could be enrolled in a dual-credit class. (14)

Third, the understanding reflected in the dual-credit format that all students are indeed different and they each learn at different levels and that those levels can indicate a significant advancement in the academic acumen of each individual student. Hence, students who are enrolled in the eleventh grade could quite possibly be able to tackle college or university course material due to their higher intellect. Therefore, those student’s attributes are acknowledged, via a process that does not restrict their learning by ensuring that they are challenged at a higher cogitative level. By introducing this approach students who would normally be disengaged are now being challenged and as a result value their education.

Finally, the important role that effective communication plays in facilitating the dual-credit process. Placating the challenges relating to communication helps to establish foundations, within and between institutions, to ensure that the quality of the curriculum can be upheld and therefore, maintained. From Andrews’ perspective effective communication was based not just simply on educational links but rather links designed to facilitate quality control over the dual-credit program. Andrews emphasized that the only way for dual-credit to survive was when students were given a high level of instruction in each and every course that they were enrolled in. (15) Clearly, Andrews emphasis was on quality teaching so that the content and the associated assessment, being delivered, was of a standard commensurate with the desired outcomes of the course. Hence, communication was about ensuring that the processes being employed in the delivery of the content and the associated assessment were acknowledged by all stake holders as acceptable. Added to this, was also the need to ensure that the content and assessment tasks not only reflected the difficulty of this advanced curriculum but that students were assessed with the appropriate level of academic acumen. Without this type of quality control, essentially driven by effective communication, the entire dual-credit process could not confidently validate its outcomes.

It is due to these four processes that when a student is accepted into the dual-credit program invariably they succeed because the concept has been designed,

. . . to deliver high-quality college experiences to high-performing school students; and to enrich and extend the high school curriculum, provide introductory college coursework, and avoid un-necessary duplication in coursework as students move from high school to college. (16)

However, while dual-credit has been a proven success it only focuses on a small clique of students who clearly are, by virtue of their selection, academically ready for their placement. Yet, by examining dual-credit and the processes associated with it, there is a window of opportunity to explore the elements that contribute to its success so that further applications could be developed and promulgated.

Dual-accreditation recognizes that students are indeed all individuals and that they learn at different rates and at different levels. Hence, acknowledging that students in the eleventh grade, for example, are capable of undertaking college or university courses sends a clear message to all stake holders that the current model may well be retarding the education of a number of gifted or mature students. This recognition of individualism highlights that within the education system there needs to be a greater emphasis placed on flexibility, with respect to content, assessment etc. Obviously, from Andrews’ research, there are a number of students who are currently studying in high schools that find their class work unchallenging and therefore, uninteresting. If all students learn at different rates by locking those students into, for example, a set content and forcing them all to learn at the same level will ultimately result in the disengagement of some students. This is becoming abundantly clear, as Andrews noted on numerous occasions within the context of his work. Yet, one of the main strengths of dual-credit is it ability to address this situation. Therefore, when high school students, as viewed by Andrews, are able to avoid duplication in their high school curriculum and at the same time are handed the opportunity to move ahead with their college work (17) dual-credit is recognizing the fluidity of knowledge and the flexibility associated with a 21 st-century economy.

By encouraging the college or university to direct their attention back to the high school dual-credit breaks from the traditional view, associated with the 19 th-century industrial thinking, of “. . . follow(ing) instructions so that everything that went out the factory door – be it soap or sofas – was exactly the same.” (18) Quality control within this economy advocated only one standard for all whereas in the 21 st-century this is clearly not the case.

Dual-credit by linking high school students to either college or university overtly sends a message to the policy makers that the 21 st-century is an ideas economy and as such simply receiving information is no longer acceptable. The focus now is on creating information and this requires highly skilled and highly educated workers. (19) In order to create this information, the right information, calls for not just simply being creative but rather relies heavily on critical analysis, assessment, experimentation and evaluation skills. (20) Dual-credit facilitates this by challenging students at a higher cognitive level, via college or university, and by ensuring that their development is commensurate with the standards and outcomes needed to graduate at that level. In this way dual-credit students are actively participating in developing their critical analysis, assessment, experimentation and evaluation skills at a time when it is most needed.

By continuing to develop education along the same lines of the industrial model, and therefore failing to acknowledge its shortfalls, educationalists run the risk of not only making the “. . . senior year . . . as a lost cause” but ultimately K-16. (21) History is quite clear about this because the developments that have occurred within the past 200 years have invariably impacted, both in a positive and negative way, upon all levels of society. The economic success of any nation is inextricable linked to its standard of education. Hence curriculum, educational pedagogy and organizational structure mirrored the views of industry because it is at the industrial level that the application, of 12 or 16 years of education, is implemented. Consequently when executives like Jack Welch, boss of General Electric, expressed the view, as noted by Spender, that his employees had “to leave their brains in the car park” (22) when they arrived at work indicated that GE’s work environment did not cater to individuality or creativity. Within this work environment performance was rigidly controlled and supervised. Quite clearly, this expectation was also reflected within the educational environment.

Dual-credit offers educators the opportunity to look at the current model for education and to explore ways in which that model can be molded to adapt to the needs of not just simply a small cohort of students but eventually the entire student body. The lessons that can be learnt from dual-accreditation are very simple, yet they are seminal to well being of society.

First, the present model for education is obviously unsustainable in its current form. Society cannot continue to simply throw money at education without there being both qualitative and quantitative outcomes. While dual-credit does address the needs of students in the 21 st-century, and it is able to deliver cost savings, it fails to meet the needs of all students. This must be the priority for policy makers in the 21 st-century and beyond.

Second, the disengagement of students is occurring not simply at high school level but also at all levels of the education system. The American public is becoming increasingly annoyed at the “absolute failure of public education” (23) and if this situation is left unabated then obviously the public’s resentment towards public education will increase. There is no doubt that this resentment will culminate in action via the ballot box or through the closure of public schools as whole communities disengage. Dual-credit shows us how an education process can reengage students and this must be seen as a positive. However, to prevent a mass exodus from public education more needs to be done to meet the needs of the community, as a whole.

Third, recognizing the individual and their needs is fast becoming the focal point of any education system. The 21 st-century is about instantaneous communication hence, students who interact in this world are more ethnocentrically focused than any other group before in the history of this planet. Students want an education that acknowledges their needs and can also find ways in which to address those needs quickly and accurately. While dual-credit attempts to undertake this on a small scale it is restricted by a teaching “model that is 40 years old”. (24) The limitations that are placed on students via an educator centered model, for example; one teacher to thirty student ratio, has no place in the curriculum of the 21 st-century. Technology has always been seen as a possible panacea however, educationalist need to find ways in which 21 st-century, and not 19 th-century, thinking can be aligned with 21 st –century technology in ameliorating these shortfalls in education.

Finally, dual-credit is laconically telling the policy makers that what they are doing is not working and that changes need to occur. The problem of course is that policy makers tend to address educational issues via a band-aid approach, thereby not really solving the problem. By undertaking this approach there is a great deal of ambiguity because society believes that the policy makers, through their actions are solving the problem, but only to find out later that they had not. What dual-credit highlights is that the best way to deal with this dilemma is for policy makers to ask society what it wants. Then using that as a base from which to work from, development an educational process that fulfills society’s requirements. That development should incorporate all of the stake holders involved, for example, families, educational institutions and finally, students. One of the strengths of dual-credit, and Andrews acknowledged this, was the importance placed on quality control. The level of quality control attributed to dual-accreditation would not have been possible without effective communication. This effective communication was not just simply telling people what they had to do but rather listening to them, and then people working together to solve the problem. Dual-accreditation could not have attained it success if only one person or group or organization had been in total control and therefore, only one-way communication. The effective communication network that was established, via dual-credit, clearly espoused the virtues of a 21 st-century economy. Within this economy individuals are not just simply told what to do but are expected to think for themselves; through thinking analytically, experimenting, assessing and evaluating to find solutions for the problems which they encounter. The disengagement of gifted high school students, for example, was not just the concern of the high school but also ultimately the colleges and universities. In attempting to placate this problem, as dual-credit highlighted, it could not be solved by one, but instead by many.

The message that gifted and educationally mature students are conveying is, ‘Don’t tell me what to do, give me the information so that I can think for myself and then let’s work together to find a solution.’ When this message was listened to, and then applied through the dual-credit program the results have been outstanding. It is now up to the policy makers to adapt the elements of the dual-credit program to ensure that the whole of society can ultimately benefit from its success.







References

Spender, D., 2007, smh.com.au, February, Letters, p. 38
ibid.
ibid.
Dr Hans A Andrews Dual Credit Phenomenon! Challenging Secondary School Students Across 50 States, 2001, New Forums Press, U.S.A.
Andrews, H.A., 2001, 2001, Dual Credit Phenomenon! Challenging Secondary School Students Across 50 States, p.1., New Forums Press, U.S.A.
ibid, p.2.
ibid, pp.7 & 8
ibid, p.8.
ibid, p.8.
ibid.
ibid, taken from ‘About the Book’.
Quality teaching is also mentioned within the context of Andrews’ work and was therefore outlined as a definition of a high level of instruction by the author.
Andrews, H.A., 2001, 2001, Dual Credit Phenomenon! Challenging Secondary School Students Across 50 States, p.73., New Forums Press, U.S.A.
ibid.
ibid.
ibid, p. 43.
ibid.
Spender, D., 2007, smh.com.au, February, Letters, p. 38
ibid.
ibid.
Andrews, H.A., 2001, 2001, Dual Credit Phenomenon! Challenging Secondary School Students Across 50 States, p.1., New Forums Press, U.S.A.
Spender, D., 2007, smh.com.au, February, Letters, p. 38
Redden, E., 2007, Higher Education and the High Schools, January, 23rd
http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/01/23/summit (At the end of the article readers were able to comment on the content. This response was one of those comments – C. Bigsby, at 9.55am EST, January 23, 2007. The author acknowledges that this is only one comment. However, the old adage ‘Where there is smoke there is fire’ must surly apply.
Jaschik, S., 2007, A Curricular Debate: Classic or Retro? January, 22nd.
http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/01/22/aacu - This comment was made by Professor Jeremy Bell, a philosophy professor and Academic Senate president at the college of San Mateo.