Dual enrollment implementation in California

The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) released a fact sheet, “Dual Enrollment in California,” in November that tracks the expansion of dual enrollment in the state. Dual enrollment enables high school students to take college courses and earn college credits. After stagnating during the pandemic, participation began to rebound, reaching nearly 150,000 students, or about 30 percent, of the high school class of 2024. In 2016, Assembly Bill 288 established the College and Career Access Pathways (CCAP) to promote high school and postsecondary success among underrepresented students by improving access to dual enrollment. Thirty-seven percent of the class of 2024 took dual enrollment through CCAP.

In the class of 2023, Latino students made up 46 percent of all dual enrollment students, followed by white students at 23 percent, Asian students at 17 percent and Black students at 4 percent. Access to dual enrollment has historically been uneven and marked by racial/ethnic disparities. For example, Black students make up 5 percent of the class of 2023 and are underrepresented in dual enrollment; Latino students make up 56 percent of the class of 2023 and are underrepresented overall but better represented in CCAP at 55 percent.

The class of 2023 took an average of three dual enrollment courses and earned an average of eight credits. The number of high school students earning a college certificate or degree has increased steadily over time and in 2023, dual enrollees earned over 2,400 college credentials, including 1,500 associate degrees.

The majority of all dual enrollment courses are in social and behavioral sciences (23 percent), humanities (14 percent), math (8 percent), and interdisciplinary studies (7 percent).

In 2023, the Los Angeles/Orange County region was home to the most dual enrollees (29 percent), followed by the Bay Area (21 percent) and the San Joaquin Valley (15 percent). Since 2016–17, dual enrollment participation has grown most in the Inland Empire (189 percent), the San Joaquin Valley (158 percent) and the north/far north (113 percent).

A dual enrollment roadmap

An October 2024 report from the Career Ladders Project and the Los Angeles Regional Consortium exploring equitable dual enrollment pathway implementation in spring 2024 through the Dual Enrollment Pathway Institute. Six teams consisting of dual enrollment leads, administrators, pathway coordinators and instructors from the colleges, high school districts and high schools used the Dual Enrollment Pathway Implementation Roadmap to design their programs.

The roadmap calls for three main “stops” where local educational agencies should carefully consider different factors before moving ahead:

  1. Assess the partnership: This includes reviewing current dual enrollment legislation, regulations and policies; evaluating current partnership agreements; assessing dual enrollment teams and roles; identifying opportunities for increased collaboration, examining dual enrollment offerings and identifying opportunities for growth.
  2. Select a pathway: In this step, teams should brainstorm potential pathways; assess local education and employment opportunities; evaluate student interest; identify scheduling, location and modality differences; and identify instructor preferences and qualifications.
  3. Plan for implementation: This stage gets into more specifics, such as selecting courses and planning course sequencing; exploring scheduling and instructor options; determining necessary equipment and materials; planning outreach, awareness and enrollment with a focus on equitable access; planning for embedded student supports; and setting goals for student and program success.

Check out Dual Enrollment Pathway Implementation Roadmap: Designing equitable dual enrollment pathways that promote excellence, quality and successful transitions from high school to college to career for examples of how districts worked with their community college partners and used the roadmap to implement and improve their programs.