Texas and California are two of the most populous states in the country and, at times, they face similar challenges when it comes to education and workforce readiness. The two states’ political differences are often reflected in their approach to policy solutions. Yet, even with different approaches, both states have undertaken the same objective: to leverage dual enrollment (or as Texas calls it, dual credit) to address long term postsecondary education goals in each state.

For the past year, ACCT has engaged in a project through the Center for Policy and Practice to examine how these states tackled issues of workforce readiness and postsecondary education goals by utilizing dual enrollment in a systemic approach to increase participation and success by high school students. The results of this project can be found in two recently published briefs: 

• Building a Bridge to Opportunity: The Rise of Dual Credit Pathways in Texas and 
• Expanding Opportunities for Students: Lessons from the Growth of Dual Enrollment Pathways in California. 

In Texas, dual credit growth was closely tied to a new funding formula for community colleges across the state which focused on outcomes for students and rewarded workforce pathways for students. Likewise, in California, the growth in dual enrollment was closely tied to a new funding stream intended to help high school and community college partnerships for dual enrollment with the goal of closing equity gaps that existed in the state.

Through these briefs, we see two different goals being addressed via dual enrollment. These are models that other states can utilize to strengthen post-secondary education completion and workforce readiness by investing time and resources into growing their dual enrollment programs. This approach can be effective regardless of what political party is in control of the governor’s mansion or state legislature as both states showed that with the right approach specific to the realities of the state, dual enrollment can help address needs of the state and boost the number of high school students with postsecondary credentials and the skills needed in local labor markets.

Texas over the past decade has overhauled how the state funds community colleges. The state shifted to an outcome-based model where the funding mechanism rewards community colleges that increase pathways for students. Dual credit has played a key role in this new model as it helps college meet several of the criteria needed to get additional funding, such as having students complete 15 credit hours to transfer, complete workforce certificates, or successfully advance towards an AA. While dual enrollment was already growing in popularity before these new incentives came into place, oftentimes, it was limited to high-performing students who were already college-bound. As such, the state also accounted for differences in need for different student populations, providing extra funding for colleges that successfully support students from low-income backgrounds for example.

In a similar way, California established the College and Career Access Pathway program (CCAP). CCAP seeds partnerships between high schools and their local community colleges to provide dual enrollment programs. It is targeted at those who may not already be college bound or who are underrepresented in higher education. This was a response to California seeing a similar trend in the dual enrollment participation, which was growing but continued being limited to students who were already college-bound and who were predominantly white. CCAP came into existence with the primary goal of helping close that equity gap in dual enrollment program participation and data has shown that it has been successful, closing the gap between white and Latino students participating and succeeding in the programs.

While Texas and California looked at dual enrollment as a tool to address different challenges (workforce pathways and equity gaps respectively), both have succeeding in finding a model that can truly help scale up dual enrollment participation. But to be successful, the states had to commit to supporting the efforts not via unfunded mandates but by investing and establishing critical funding mechanisms. This approach ensured that colleges had the resources to properly support the growing number of students participating.  Doing this has opened the door to postsecondary education to greater portions of the population and helps prepare more students from an earlier age for college – whether a traditional college pathway to a bachelor’s degree, or a workforce focused credential that can lead to a well-paying job in a shorter time. We hope these briefs can serve as blueprints for community college leaders in other states to look at how to best establish or strengthen state-wide initiatives on dual enrollment.

José Miranda is the Director of Government Relations at ACCT

Photo credit: Great Basin College