Jessica Pastore is a senior at GlenOak High School in Canton. She knows she wants to attend college, and she knows she wants to study medicine. She’s just not sure if she wants to focus on people or animals.
Whichever career path she chooses, Pastore is already working toward her education thanks to the Stark Education Partnership, which allows her to earn college credit for her English class at GlenOak.
Research shows that students who earn college credits while in high school enroll in college and finish their degrees faster than their peers.
The Stark Education Partnership, headed by president Adrienne O’Neill, wanted to find a way to give more high school students the chance to earn college credit, in particular those students in low-wealth urban and rural districts. Last school year, 12 Stark County school districts and partnering colleges implemented the high school-based dual credit.
Stark County’s high school teachers, working with college professor mentors, teach the content using college syllabi and grading standards. The heavy workload can be difficult to adjust to at first, especially for students who have never had the opportunity to earn college credit before.
“I found my first semester of my dual-credit English class challenging,” Pastore says. “I had to make my own opinions and challenge others.”
Pastore says she talked to her teacher and other students to make the class more manageable. In addition, some dual-credit courses are taught throughout a full school year, rather than one semester, to give students more time to master the challenging material.
Stark Education Partnership hopes the dual-credit courses will better prepare students for higher education. “It shows the real work ethic needed to be successful,” Pastore says.
Perhaps more importantly, experiencing success in dual-credit courses can give students confidence. “Dual-credit has benefited me not only in learning more about grammar, but communication,” Pastore says. “It has taught me to stand up for myself.”