Lakeland Catholic School District (LCSD) has seen a climb in students taking advantage of their dual credit courses.
Approximately 140 senior high school students Grades 10 to 12 are enrolled in dual credit courses through LCSD, the school board are predicting the same number of students to enroll in these courses next semester.
This is a 15 per cent increase from last year's enrolment in the program.
Currently LCSD high schools offer a variety of dual credit courses, allowing students to not only obtain a high school level credit, but also a post-secondary level credit or external certificate.
Courses include driver training, early childhood education, hairstyling, oil and exploration, sport medicine, university studies, wildlife studies, and youth evangelization.
“It helps them think meaningfully about what pathway they want to go on, and is a great highlight on resumes and post-secondary applications,” explained LCSD Career and Technology Studies (CTS) and dual credit coordinator Amanda Wildman. “The idea is that these courses are empowering to our students, and it helps them to meaningfully reflect on future careers and post-secondary programs.”
Wildman said careers and post-secondary go hand-in-hand, because when students are thinking about their future they are thinking what they need to accomplish in order to get there.
“The idea is to encourage them to participate in post-secondary,” Wildman added.
Not all LCSD high schools have these courses available, with only a select few offered at both Assumption High School and Notre Dame High School.
Through the dual credit courses program, students are able to better determine whether or not a certain career path is meant for them, and have expressed interest in more programs offered through some of the partnering post-secondary institutions, including a green certificate program or agricultural based course.
Working with Lakeland College, Portage College and soon NAIT, after signing a Memorandum of Understanding in December, LCSD is able to offer these programs.
Partnerships, Wildman said, are important, especially when they are between secondary and post secondary schools.
“It opens up opportunities for our students now and in the future,” explained Wildman, adding some schools offer a different type of programming, which locks students into courses for Grades 10 through 12, called the Lock Step program.
It's also a bit more of a commitment on the family and students part, and allows for very little flexibility for students who may change their mind later on, which could be one of the reasons why these programs show little success, explained Wildman.
“I think it's important that our students have the opportunity to experience a variety of different types of courses, and different types of jobs, and be able to experience them in a real life situation,” said LCSD board chair Mary Anne Penner, adding the program allows for students to explore career options.
“Many students have lots of things running through their minds, like most of us do, that they would like to try, but because they don't have the opportunity to try them, they end up being pushed into areas that they may not really want to be.”
She continued, the more experience students have prior to heading into post-secondary, the more likely they are to know what they are wanting to do as a career, and “enables them to make better life choices for themselves.”
There are no fees associated with the dual credit programs, but students who are taking certification programs may be required to pay the cost of the certification.
Wildman used driver training as an example, and said yes students are required to pay, but the difference between taking the course through the school and somewhere else is significant.
“The way we have worked it, our students are not paying a tuition, they do pay a fee for driver training, but the way we have worked it is so it is cost recovery, and it is at a significantly reduced rate,” she said, adding family's save hundreds of dollars.
She added, if anything, their enrolment in dual credit courses shows the success of the program, and how students are benefitting.
Students are claiming the program has helped them prepare for post-secondary education by boosting their confidence, and helping them decide the direction they want to go.
LCSD also offers a summer program for dual credit courses, which allows students, who may feel their workload through the school year is heavy enough as it is, to take advantage of the program.
“Many kids want to do these things, but they don't fit into their very full academic schedule,” explained Wildman, adding people often assume that students in dual-credit or summer programs are not academic students.
“In fact, a lot of them are. They want to look at these opportunities and to try these things out, and when we offer it this way, we have kids lined up,” she explained.
Moving forward, the board would like to add more courses to the program, including healthcare foundations, environment science, and 3D printing and design.
Penner said, “I think dual credits offer students an opportunity, in many cases, that students earlier on did not have. I really think that this is an advantage for our students.”
