Between the cost of a college degree and the shifting higher education landscape, high school students are looking for ways to earn college credit while still in high school.
More accessible than AP or IB courses, motivated students continue to turn to dual credit programs to jumpstart their postsecondary education. That’s why many colleges have built strong partnerships with their local high schools to provide those dual credit programs. But with limitations such as on-campus registration and exams, minimum enrollments and high instructional costs, many colleges are unnecessarily restricting the number of students they can help with their programs.
Online courses, however, remove many of those limitations. With online delivery, students have the flexibility to take their entire course in the environment they are used to, both high schools and the college behind the dual credit program can keep costs low, and colleges can reach more students with affordable college credit.
Reach More Students
You likely have strong ties with the high schools in your immediate area. But that reach dissipates quickly once you start moving outside of an easy drive so students can take tests without missing a full day of class. With online courses, more students have access to dual credit because they can take the courses at their high school through proctored exams. You can reach students at more rural high schools who wouldn’t be able to come to campus for an exam. This also allows your college to build stronger relationships with those schools and show those students everything you have to offer.
Expand Your Catalog
Because of the cost difference between a dual enrollment course and a traditional course taken on your campus, you often have to make sure you meet minimums for it to make sense to offer your courses for high school students. So your College Algebra course usually makes the cut, but if one or two students want to enroll in your Introduction to Communication course, you have to turn them away. With online courses, you can provide more options for students by having low minimum enrollments. With an enrollment of just one student, you can make sure any student who wants to take a course for college credit can, no matter how popular the course.
Help Keep Costs Low
Building a course takes time and money. Building a high-quality online course with intentional course design and assignments focused on mastery takes a lot of time and a lot of money. Instead of creating courses for dual credit from scratch, white-labeling a highly engineered course from TEL Education helps you provide a rigorous curriculum for high school students that prepares them for college-level work while keeping your costs down. And when your costs are low, you have more flexibility and can keep costs low for your students as well.
Help Your Students and Your College
As long as the cost of a traditional college degree stays high and high school students have the opportunity to earn credit while also knocking out their high school requirements, dual enrollment courses will continue to be a popular option. By including online courses in your current dual credit program, you help more students get closer to their goal of a college degree while also increasing the number of students in your pipeline.
