Dual Enrollment

I am currently a sophomore in high school, so this issue is not urgent. However, I am currently at the top of my class and would like to maintain this position for the rest of high school in order to have the best chance of getting into my dream college(MIT). My school offers dual enrollment for juniors and seniors at a local college. Is it worth it to enroll? I’m questioning it for two reasons. My high school is very competitive, and I would be sacrificing potential AP classes in order to dual enroll. Would the DE classes boost my high school GPA as much as the AP classes I can take in high school? My second concern has to do with the appeal to colleges. Is dual enrollment appealing to high level colleges if it’s through a county college? Furthermore, where can I check what course credits specific colleges accept from DE classes?

My nephew’s high school did not offer APs so he took 6 dual enrollment classes with a nearby college. However, although they were dual enrollment and although he did receive college credit, the classes were taught by a teacher at his high school (he did take the final with the college students at the nearby college). Because of this, his private university did not accept any of the dual enrollment credits, which was disappointing as it would have cut his time at his university by a semester. They would have accepted the AP credits, though. Just something to consider if you are hoping to have your dual enrollment credits count in college.

Ask your guidance counseler or look up the weighted gpa policies online. I like dual enrollment because there’s so many more options for classes but it tanked my class rank because the DE classes weren’t weighted (dumb school policy change and unclearness is dumb) oh well. Totally depends on the school. I like DE classes anyway because my schedule is better and I’m doing second year mechanical engineering classes in my senior year of high school.

At my dd’s school all dual enrollment courses are weighted identical to AP classes (unless they are developmental). As a parent before I let my daughter decide if she wanted to do full time dual enrollment we contacted tons of schools state and private to ask admissions about dual enrollment. For the most part no matter what level of school we talked to from low level to highly selective schools they all said dual enrollment classes were looked upon favorably and no better/worse than AP or IB. We only contacted schools in the North East.

We don’t have county colleges so I’m not familiar with that but if you mean community colleges yes those were the ones I asked about and I mentioned that to every school. If you opt to do full time dual enrollment you might find you get to do more classes a year compared to high school classes which may give you more time to explore subjects or advance higher in a particular area. My daughter loves having the more flexible schedule. Another thing that may be useful for my daughter (who has some hearing loss) is she is taking many entry level classes that have a chance of getting her out of the large lecture halls for those classes at many 4 year colleges. Also if a particular class doesn’t really interest you it finishes quicker though if you love it it stil finishes quicker.

As to checking there is no set answer. Some colleges have something on their website often found under transfer students that lists if specific courses from specific colleges will transfer. I’ve seen it called transfer equivalency and transfer calculator etc. Some don’t mention it online but when you call admissions they know about it or recommend you talk to transfer admissions even though you would start as a freshman with advanced standing.

I’m assuming by dual enrollment you’ll be taking classes on an actual college campus with college students. For some reason it changes things if your taking a college level class at your high school with all high school students. None of the schools we talked to gave credit for AP but not dual enrollment. However you don’t necessarily get credit for every class, sometimes they just count as free electives which may not help at all, sometimes they just allow you to start at a higher level but not give credit etc.