Abstract
The Obama administration has been focusing on preparing young people for middle-skilled jobs, and as a result has placed strong emphasis on strengthening community colleges. One promising strategy to promote attendance at community colleges is dual credit, which enables high school students to earn high school credit and college credit at the same time. This paper aims to discuss the articulation between high schools and community colleges, focusing on dual credit. In Kentucky, accelerating degree production has been a longstanding issue. The Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS) facilitates dual credit in academic coursework for high school students in order to reduce remedial education and improve matriculation rates. KCTCS also offers dual credit in technical coursework through career pathways consisting of stackable credentials. KCTCS has developed these pathways statewide in partnership with local employers. This type of dual credit improves career readiness, including the opportunity to earn certificates at graduation from a Kentucky high school. Dual credit provides high school students with the opportunity not only to earn college credit while still in high school, but also to learn more about the expectations of education at the college level. The most positive effects of participation in dual credit are seen among student populations that are underrepresented in higher education. The 2006 reauthorization of the legislation, known as Perkins IV, includes a requirement to develop Programs of Study (POS). POS are provided in Perkins IV in order to offer more specific guidelines, which were needed for tech prep and career pathways programming. Dual credit was introduced into POS in order to strengthen the success of transitions from high schools to community colleges.
