Is dual enrollment the new path to getting into a good college?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cornell would not take any credits that counted towards HS graduation. I assume some others schools are similar. At my kids hs, ap considered more challenging because of the exam
.

Your school is an anomaly. Even Yale counts Ib, DE and AP the same in admissions.

But Yale does not let one use DE for credit, yet does allow (some) IB and AP for credit. Yale understands they are not the same. As do these schools:

Princeton
Harvard
UPenn
Duke
Hopkins
Brown
Uchicago
Columbia
MIT

all do not take DE credits taken as a high schooler, except in rare cases of upper level math, and only if the student passes a placement test by the university.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, in fact I think it’s the opposite. My district in the Northeast doesn’t offer dual enrollment at all but plenty of APs. From the articles I’ve read, the goal of expanding dual enrollment programs is to get students to graduate high school with some community college credits so they are more likely to enroll in college and complete a degree.

In some states it’s also marketed as a way to save money and graduate in only 3 or 3.5 years. Not every college will accept those credits, though. This is most likely to work if you transfer them to a state university in the same state the student graduated high school in.

That’s so parochial, if it’s not in your district it doesn’t matter. If you’re trying to say it’s not the way to get into a good college, you are completely wrong. A large fraction of those students end up in the UC system, at Berkeley, UCLA. It’s true they are state universities, albeit top notch ones. I wouldn’t discount the other good California school, UCSD, UCSB, Cal Poly etc.

The point is tripling the number of students taking dual enrollment is significant, and these kids will apply to many of colleges in the country, regardless of dual enrollment being offered in your district or not.

Most elite privates give little to no credit for dual enrollment or AP classes. So it might be relevant for getting into a good college but not for getting into a great one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cornell would not take any credits that counted towards HS graduation. I assume some others schools are similar. At my kids hs, ap considered more challenging because of the exam
.

Your school is an anomaly. Even Yale counts Ib, DE and AP the same in admissions.

But Yale does not let one use DE for credit, yet does allow (some) IB and AP for credit. Yale understands they are not the same. As do these schools:

Princeton
Harvard
UPenn
Duke
Hopkins
Brown
Uchicago
Columbia
MIT

all do not take DE credits taken as a high schooler, except in rare cases of upper level math, and only if the student passes a placement test by the university.

That was not what was asked by OP. The question was related to assisting with admission NOT receiving credit for pre matriculation credits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It may be with the lowering of standards for AP courses and exams. It’s one way to demonstrate rigor, but not the only one. There’s more variability in the rigor of DE classes, but AP classes also fall short of a rigorous college class.

Standards for courses are all over the place. Some AP courses are a joke (the kids won’t even sit for the exam because they are unprepared even though they got A’s), and some DE courses are a joke. Other AP courses or DE courses can be quite rigorous. This is why I suspect that AP scores will become more important for quality control.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cornell would not take any credits that counted towards HS graduation. I assume some others schools are similar. At my kids hs, ap considered more challenging because of the exam
.

Your school is an anomaly. Even Yale counts Ib, DE and AP the same in admissions.

you are confusing credit with admissions.

[Anonymous]

In FCPS students take DE because they are much easier than AP classes and there is no test to take at the end of the year. For admissions, UVA doesn’t seem to care if the classes are AP or DE and count both as “the most rigor.” Students game their GPAs by taking DEs.

[Anonymous]

Asked this very question on a college visit recently. Admission director said they now use an algorithm that assesses the difficulty of the student’s high school program as well as rigor of courses. She said this recent change is due to the uptick in students with high GPAs and poor academic preparation and performance in college.

She said they essentially “zero out” GPAs and re-evaluate them based on their algorithm which rates students 1 to 4. So for instance, a student with a GPA over 4.0 who attended a mid-range high school and took DE/AP might rank below a student with a 3.8 who attended a more rigorous high school and took AP, etc.

This was our first college visit — DS is just a sophomore — so it may be common practice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, in fact I think it’s the opposite. My district in the Northeast doesn’t offer dual enrollment at all but plenty of APs. From the articles I’ve read, the goal of expanding dual enrollment programs is to get students to graduate high school with some community college credits so they are more likely to enroll in college and complete a degree.

In some states it’s also marketed as a way to save money and graduate in only 3 or 3.5 years. Not every college will accept those credits, though. This is most likely to work if you transfer them to a state university in the same state the student graduated high school in.

same as our area of the midatlantic. DE is seen as much lower quality in all our area public schools. The only exception is DE multivariable calc, calc-based physics(AP phys C equivalent, we only have AP phys 1 and 2), Diff EQ. These are not offered at our district high schools so DE is the only way. They take these classes senior year after maxing out on AP. DE in place of Calc AB or BC is where the good but not great kids are tracked after honors precalculus, if it does not go as well. Top kids track to AP Calc BC as seniors or even juniors. UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district.

"UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district." They do for the APS DE classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Asked this very question on a college visit recently. Admission director said they now use an algorithm that assesses the difficulty of the student’s high school program as well as rigor of courses. She said this recent change is due to the uptick in students with high GPAs and poor academic preparation and performance in college.

She said they essentially “zero out” GPAs and re-evaluate them based on their algorithm which rates students 1 to 4. So for instance, a student with a GPA over 4.0 who attended a mid-range high school and took DE/AP might rank below a student with a 3.8 who attended a more rigorous high school and took AP, etc.

This was our first college visit — DS is just a sophomore — so it may be common practice.

What college was this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, in fact I think it’s the opposite. My district in the Northeast doesn’t offer dual enrollment at all but plenty of APs. From the articles I’ve read, the goal of expanding dual enrollment programs is to get students to graduate high school with some community college credits so they are more likely to enroll in college and complete a degree.

In some states it’s also marketed as a way to save money and graduate in only 3 or 3.5 years. Not every college will accept those credits, though. This is most likely to work if you transfer them to a state university in the same state the student graduated high school in.

same as our area of the midatlantic. DE is seen as much lower quality in all our area public schools. The only exception is DE multivariable calc, calc-based physics(AP phys C equivalent, we only have AP phys 1 and 2), Diff EQ. These are not offered at our district high schools so DE is the only way. They take these classes senior year after maxing out on AP. DE in place of Calc AB or BC is where the good but not great kids are tracked after honors precalculus, if it does not go as well. Top kids track to AP Calc BC as seniors or even juniors. UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district.

"UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district." They do for the APS DE classes.

Yup. I can’t find an IG for Arlington Tech, but this says kids got into UVA & VT. AFAIK, Arl Tech doesn’t offer any APs. Only DE (and these kids all earned AA/AS in hs)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Asked this very question on a college visit recently. Admission director said they now use an algorithm that assesses the difficulty of the student’s high school program as well as rigor of courses. She said this recent change is due to the uptick in students with high GPAs and poor academic preparation and performance in college.

She said they essentially “zero out” GPAs and re-evaluate them based on their algorithm which rates students 1 to 4. So for instance, a student with a GPA over 4.0 who attended a mid-range high school and took DE/AP might rank below a student with a 3.8 who attended a more rigorous high school and took AP, etc.

This was our first college visit — DS is just a sophomore — so it may be common practice.

I am doubtful this is true, in fact I think it’s entirely made up. Every college admissions page states that the student is evaluated in the context of their environment, which is the exact opposite of using an algorithm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Cornell would not take any credits that counted towards HS graduation. I assume some others schools are similar. At my kids hs, ap considered more challenging because of the exam
.

Your school is an anomaly. Even Yale counts Ib, DE and AP the same in admissions.

But Yale does not let one use DE for credit, yet does allow (some) IB and AP for credit. Yale understands they are not the same. As do these schools:

Princeton
Harvard
UPenn
Duke
Hopkins
Brown
Uchicago
Columbia
MIT

all do not take DE credits taken as a high schooler, except in rare cases of upper level math, and only if the student passes a placement test by the university.

Not true at least for MIT, but it’s up to the department to evaluate the class and determine if credit can be awarded. It may or may not include a test.

https://firstyear.mit.edu/academics-exploration/ap-transfer-credit/transfer-credit/

[Anonymous]

Our older child (now college) only did AP and took the exam. Our younger child (rising HS senior) has only taken DE courses and loves it. Where we live, students must register for DE through the community college and enroll in the college essentially for those classes (maybe this is the same everywhere). It's the same class, the only difference is not having to take the AP exam. Kids gets to sleep in and now show up at 7 a.m. for the AP exam (we do it early here). DE is also more expensive in our district, probably $20-$30 more expensive per class. I think it comes down to what your kid prefers if offered both choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, in fact I think it’s the opposite. My district in the Northeast doesn’t offer dual enrollment at all but plenty of APs. From the articles I’ve read, the goal of expanding dual enrollment programs is to get students to graduate high school with some community college credits so they are more likely to enroll in college and complete a degree.

In some states it’s also marketed as a way to save money and graduate in only 3 or 3.5 years. Not every college will accept those credits, though. This is most likely to work if you transfer them to a state university in the same state the student graduated high school in.

same as our area of the midatlantic. DE is seen as much lower quality in all our area public schools. The only exception is DE multivariable calc, calc-based physics(AP phys C equivalent, we only have AP phys 1 and 2), Diff EQ. These are not offered at our district high schools so DE is the only way. They take these classes senior year after maxing out on AP. DE in place of Calc AB or BC is where the good but not great kids are tracked after honors precalculus, if it does not go as well. Top kids track to AP Calc BC as seniors or even juniors. UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district.

"UVA and VT and WM never take non-AP/full DE-program kids from our district." They do for the APS DE classes.

Yup. I can’t find an IG for Arlington Tech, but this says kids got into UVA & VT. AFAIK, Arl Tech doesn’t offer any APs. Only DE (and these kids all earned AA/AS in hs)

I know a kid who just graduated with an AA and went to a SLAC out of state. They accepted many of the DE credits but I imagine this differs school-to-school. Anyway, my kid is taking his first DE next year at Tech and is very excited.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kids take DE classes to avoid the hard teachers at their high schools. Using Rate My Professor, you can find teachers who are good but not overly demanding. Kids know what they’re doing!

It’s not like there are that many sections offered each semester to pick and choose, and there are high school kids that also take the easy classes and avoid the hard grading teachers.

When parents say the DE classes are easy, often it is to rationalize why their kids are better or deserve more.

Choosing a DE class over an AP one at the high school to game the grading is very rare. It can mess up the schedule and you don’t have the friends, support group, and it’s just far more inconvenient.

Most of the time students take DE because of scheduling conflicts or because they couldn’t get into a class they wanted to at their high school.