Dual credit enrollment sees steady increase
For the past several years, South Dakota high school students have had the opportunity to take university-level courses at USD, which count both as high school graduation credits and college credits.
These courses have seen a statewide enrollment increase at all South Dakota Board of Regents institutions with each consecutive semester, rising from 855 students in fall of 2014 to 1,203 the following spring, and leaping to 1,510 in the fall of 2015.
The courses cost high school students $40 per credit hour, while the South Dakota Department of Education covers $105 of the remaining cost.
This represents a savings of up to 85 percent when compared to paying tuition while at a university, according to USD dual enrollment data.
Scott Pohlson, USD’s vice president of Marketing, Enrollment and University Relations, estimates that high school students who take the maximum number of dual credit classes while in their junior and senior years of high school could potentially save as much as $7,400, though that’s not necessarily the average.
Pohlson said dual credits are “significantly cheaper” than taking the credits at a university. “It’s a no-brainer,” he said, adding that eligible high school students who choose not to take dual credit courses are missing out.
He noted that he spoke with one senior who had completed over 30 credit hours of university coursework, effectively eliminating her freshman year of college before it started.
The program is a major help to high school students, Michael Card, dean of Graduate and Distance Education and associate provost said.
“In a supportive environment, you get an introduction to college,” he said.
Card believes that, as a student, he personally would’ve benefitted from the program, had it existed at the time.
“I went to a small town high school, and I had exhausted the curriculum by the time I had finished my junior year of high school. In the spring semester I sat in the senior lounge and played cards almost all day. It was essentially a wasted year for me,” Card said.
For those in high school today who find themselves in a similar situation, Card believes being enrolled in a college course would be beneficial.
It’s not yet known for certain whether dual-enrolled high school students perform better academically once in college, Card said, because the program has only been in place a few years.
However, it’s known that roughly 60 percent of high schoolers who completed the courses will find themselves in a South Dakota college after graduating high school, Card said.
The students enrolled in dual credit courses are from high schools all over the state, with the largest clusters of them located in Madison, Mitchell, Lennox, Vermillion, Huron and Beresford.
Some students, who live very near one of the universities or university centers that offer the courses, choose to take the courses on-campus. However, those situated in high schools nowhere near a university typically take the courses online, Card said.
All South Dakota high school students – who meet certain eligibility requirements – are eligible to enroll in the courses, which will count as credits to all of South Dakota’s Board of Regent schools.
To be eligible, high school students must either maintain a certain GPA or ACT score or be in the upper rank of their high school class. The requirements are higher for juniors than for seniors.
The types of courses offered range from college algebra, to film appreciation, to introduction to criminal justice.
Incoming college students who have dual credit courses already completed has “complicated things somewhat” for the administration, Pohlson admits, because “students will bring in more credits which means they may be done sooner.”
Still, Pohlson said, “I see it as a positive… it exposes them (high school students) to what USD has to offer in terms of our academics.”
