Last month, we published our second college acceleration playbook, College Acceleration in Action: Five School Perspectives, which profiles interviews with high school leaders. This week, we’re drawing from that playbook to look at what state policymakers can do to promote high-quality college acceleration opportunities in their state.
The school leaders featured in College Acceleration in Action care deeply about their students’ futures, and they have strategically developed strong, valuable college acceleration opportunities to set their students up for success. But they can’t do it alone. The state plays an important role in expediting student success and recouping its investment through a more educated and skilled workforce.
Today, we will explore how state policymakers can promote high-quality college acceleration opportunities to set their communities, schools and students up for success.
College acceleration opportunities allow students to earn college credit while in high school. The most common college acceleration models include the following:
Throughout our interviews, school leaders were emphatic that the state policy could help schools give students more opportunities to attempt college-level work in high school and earn college credit. We’ve turned their insight into the following four recommendations for state policymakers.
Most school leaders specifically mentioned the importance of postsecondary student outcome data on their college acceleration students and the need to share that data with schools. The data would help school leaders drive programmatic change through the identification and promotion of best practices, as well as help market the success of these college acceleration courses to new students. The state should enact a policy to collect this data and share it with the originating school. In some cases, the data may be collected but not matched with individual students. This is also a policy that can be enacted during the upcoming fiscal environment brought on by COVID-19.
The coming state budgetary landscape will be significantly upturned by COVID-19. States will be under pressure to cut deficits and often the cuts will disproportionately fall on funding allocations outside the school budgeting formula. Some states, like Florida, will be able to protect their college acceleration options from disproportionate cuts because college acceleration is embedded in the student funding formula. In many other states, however, funds that enable students to avoid paying for exam fees, registration fees or instructional materials may be line-item allocations.
States need to avoid the temptation to disproportionately cut these college acceleration programs because the cuts would exacerbate inequities. Students, especially low-income students, will need the state to protect their ability to climb the economic mobility ladder by earning college credits in high school, subsequently enrolling in college and universities, and successfully earning a postsecondary credential. College acceleration opportunities drive that success. States need to protect these opportunities for students.
All school leaders either credited state policy incentives tied to student success in college acceleration coursework or wished their state had enacted a similar policy. Two of the school leaders acknowledged that a state financial incentive tied to student success in college acceleration coursework is a major driver in teacher interest in teaching these courses. A school incentive can similarly turbocharge college acceleration programs. With the advent of COVID-19, new school funding may be unlikely even though these performance investments will increase the number of students taking and succeeding in college-level work. However, states can review ExcelinEd’s AP Incentive Program Model Policy and begin to look at how states like North Carolina, Florida and Texas are shaping future financial incentives for student success.
Some school leaders either credited consistent guidelines for the credit acceptance and transfer of college credit earned through college acceleration opportunities or lamented a uniform guideline’s absence.
In some states, the governing board for higher education or individual colleges and universities determine college credit acceptance for college acceleration coursework or exam passage. In other states, the state legislature requires colleges and universities to accept certain exam scores or grades for college credit. Regardless, the state should ensure consistent guidelines are followed for credit acceptance and transfer in consultation with colleges and universities. Inconsistency within states often depends on the type of postsecondary institution considering the credit (e.g., a research-based university versus a regional institution or community college). However, states also need to consider potential inconsistencies in how college credit is applied by college acceleration opportunity type. For example, is a qualifying score in AP, Cambridge or IB treated the same as college credit earned through dual credit? Inconsistency and the lack of information about the credit acceptance before students enroll in the college acceleration course may deter students from attempting college-level work. School leaders can use a consistent guideline on college credit to promote college acceleration opportunities to students.
States also need to consider creating guidelines to protect the credits students may have earned in other states. For example, one school serves many military families who often transfer from one state to another. States can—and should—recognize the credits students have successfully completed in college acceleration programs in other states.
