Dual Credit, also known as dual enrollment or concurrent enrollment, has been offered at colleges and universities since the 1970s (Kim & Bragg, 2008). Dual credit programs allow students to take college-level courses while still in high school and receive both college and high school credit for successful completion of the courses. While much…

Over the past few decades, standards-based educational reforms in the U.S. have sought to enhance students' college and career readiness. The most recent wave of such reforms has emphasized writing as an essential aspect of college readiness and a 21st century skill necessary for success in the workplace. A common feature of these conversations…

Dual enrollment has become an embedded aspect of our writing programs yet is still an under-researched area within rhetoric and composition. One reason for this research gap is that many DE students experience their FYC courses on secondary campuses, liminal spaces that are more difficult to access for research. DE students within these spaces…

Dual-credit programs, also known in the state of Ohio as the College-Credit-Plus program, is an initiative across the United States to provide another method for high school students--and sometimes even younger students--to earn postsecondary credit before graduating from high school. This project investigates the experience of dual-credit…

Based on Bowden's (1993) notion of containment, this study analyzes how containment--as well as other pedagogical restrictions and limitations--was manifested in the high-school-to-college transition of first year student writers. This study addresses the following questions of inquiry: "How do participants' experiences in high school affect…

The purpose of this study was to explore the writing experiences of at-risk college freshmen. The term at-risk applies to students who entered college deemed under prepared for success with college level writing demands. An examination of previous high school writing courses was explored in hopes of understanding the experiences that shaped their…

The demand for concurrent enrollment courses, which allow high school students to earn college credit and high school credit simultaneous, is increasing and more students than ever are using these courses as a bridge to their college education. Despite a history of marginalization, an increasing number of students of color are also joining…

This qualitative study explored the experience of five first-time college students enrolled in and two faculty members who taught the first semester of college composition with embedded writing intervention tools. Student participants were all first-time college students enrolled in the first semester of college composition; research was conducted…

In US-based postsecondary education, first-year students commonly have their compositional ability consequentially assessed on the basis of standardized tests. As a result, students who score above certain thresholds on ACT, SAT, or AP exams often are placed into honors or remedial courses; receive credit remissions; and/or test out of general…

This study focused on how self-efficacy and self-apprehensiveness affected student perception and success in a first-year composition course at a community college. The purpose of this study was to uncover the factors that led to successful writers with a focus on self-efficacy and collegiate writing, namely introductory college composition.

The optional ACT® writing test is designed to measure students' writing skills -- specifically, those skills emphasized and acquired in high school English classes and important for success in entry-level college composition courses. The test was first introduced in 2005, and in fall 2015, a number of enhancements to the former version were…

At a four-year public comprehensive university in 2017, a mandated attempt to implement a corequisite model for Basic Writing education challenged assumptions about the types of students enrolled in the existing program. Students, who by institutional placement measures (ACT scores) would be placed in First-Year Writing, were voluntarily enrolling…

For the past ten years, the author has been teaching a dual credit college first-year writing course to seniors in high school. In this article, the author presents a framework for writing instruction and evaluation that centers on students responding to current topics and issues through digital writing for an authentic audience.

Intended as a convenient and cost-efficient way for students to earn their first college credits while still in high school, dual-credit, or concurrent enrollment, is transforming many first-year writing (FYW) programs. Many institutions emphasize that dual-credit courses are the same as traditional college courses, yet "[dual-credit] tends…

In an effort to better understand how students' length of exposure to American secondary schools relates to academic performance in core, first-year college courses, this study surveyed and analyzed the demography, study habits, and grades of 267 freshman composition (ENG 101) students at a large, urban community college. Results indicated that…