High school education looks very different today than it did just a few years ago. As education continues to change, it is vital for schools to find new ways to prepare students for their next steps after graduation. A leader in this area, Cincinnati Christian Schools (CCS) focuses on a program that helps students earn college credit hours while they are still in high school. Free to students, these college courses are paid for by the state of Ohio. In offering this program, CCS is equipping its students to potentially save both time and money as they pursue a college degree. During the 2020-21 school year, CCS students will earn approximately 500 college credit hours! This equates to tens of thousands of tuition dollars for these students. Because they had a head start while at CCS, they can now complete college in less time.
This dual enrollment program, called College Credit Plus, is available to all high school students in Ohio. Most students who want to take advantage of the College Credit Plus program must leave their high school campus during the school day or take online courses. For those students, registering for college classes usually means they have to sacrifice high school courses because the schedules conflict. In addition, those students often do not get to spend time with their peers in a typical high school environment. CCS is uniquely positioned to offer its students the benefits of the College Credit Plus program, while mitigating drawbacks at the same time.
CCS currently offers twelve different college courses to its high school students. The school is blessed to have many expert teachers who also qualify as adjunct college faculty. Because of this, the school can build student schedules that allow them to take a combination of high school and college courses during a typical school day. Taking college courses within a traditional high school day, CCS students are able to stay on their campus and be part of the faith-based community.
Most high schools offer Advanced Placement (AP) courses that allow students to potentially earn college credit for high school courses. AP courses require students to pay to take a test at the end of the school year for a chance to earn college cred-it, but colleges are not bound to give credit for passing scores on an AP exam. College Credit Plus courses are college courses for which students earn credit at the end of the course, with no additional costs. Colleges used to consider AP courses the most rigorous courses students could take while in high school, but they now consider AP and dual enrollment courses equivalent. For that reason, CCS has decided to focus on dual enrollment courses so that students can maximize the number of college credit hours earned in high school. Courses taken through this program are guaranteed to transfer for equivalent credit to any public college within Ohio. CCP courses are also considered highly transferable at out of state colleges and universities.
Mrs. Kimberly Stone, the principal of CCS’s Junior/Senior High Campus, reports that the school plans to offer sixteen college courses on its campus for the 2021-22 academic year. This 33% increase in offerings will allow students to earn even more college credits while staying at the high school they love. To expand the program, CCS is ex-cited to start an exclusive partnership with Cincinnati State College. New courses will continue to allow synchronous learning during the school day. A Cincinnati State professor will use technology to stream lectures live while the CCS students learn together in a high school classroom. This new program has room for continued growth as CCS encourages its student to complete their “First Semester…First Year…and work toward their First Degree.”
How does all this add up? A 2016 alumnus of CCS just graduated from college with a master’s degree in 4½ years, finishing the program 1½ years ahead of schedule. A 2019 graduate of CCS has been able to cut a 5-year bachelor’s degree program to 4 years. Other students have been able to work a part-time job or earn an additional major or minor in their traditional four years of college. The savings add up quickly as CCS helps its high school students who are academically ready to start college.
At CCS, our desire is to offer an academically rigorous program that equips our students for college and career. With a wide variety of courses to choose from, our CCS and CCP Accelerate programs. CCS superintendent, Mr. Ray Kochis, concludes, “We are excited about this opportunity for our CCP students. The choice for them to get a semester, a year, or an associate’s degree out of the way, while in high school, is huge.”
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