Five more Denver high schools this year were designated as “early colleges,” bringing to seven the number of city schools at which students can stay additional years to take free college courses with the aim of earning significant credit, an associate’s degree or industry certificate.
“Many of our students are first-generation college students and this designation offers them resources to not only access college credit but to receive the support needed to ensure success,” Martin Luther King, Jr. Early College principal Kimberly Grayson said Wednesday.
Grayson spoke in the atrium of the far northeast Denver school beneath a striking black-and-white mural of its namesake and the words, “Your future starts today!” She said when she started as principal five years ago, the school offered three college courses, also referred to as concurrent enrollment courses. This year, she said, MLK will offer 20 college courses.
While the school previously participated in a state program called ASCENT that allows students who meet certain academic criteria to remain in their local school districts for a fifth year and use state per-pupil education funding to pay for college courses, Grayson said the early college designation allows MLK to offer that opportunity to all of its students.
“Our students know early on they have a path to college,” Grayson said.
Manual High School, High Tech Early College, the Denver School of Innovation and Sustainable Design, and West Early College were designated along with MLK by the Colorado State Board of Education as early college high schools this past spring. West Early College last year narrowly staved off a district recommendation to close the school for low performance.
Two other Denver high schools were previously designated as early colleges: CEC Early College, in 2015, and Southwest Early College, a charter school, in 2009.
Early colleges are part of an effort in Colorado and nationwide to make postsecondary education more accessible and affordable, especially for historically underserved students. They were created by state lawmakers and are defined as high schools that offer a curriculum designed so students graduate with an associate’s degree or 60 college credits.
Students also can earn industry certificates in fields such as graphic design or accounting.
Many high schools offer free concurrent enrollment classes, but giving all students the opportunity to stay until they earn 60 credits or an associate’s degree is what sets early colleges apart. According to Misti Ruthven, the Colorado Department of Education executive director of student pathways, students can stay enrolled in early college high schools until they’re 21.
The Colorado Department of Education website lists a total of 20 early colleges statewide, including the seven in Denver Public Schools, the state’s largest school district.
Alondra Gil-Gonzalez is a sophomore at CEC Early College. She said she was nervous when she took her first college class, a computer keyboarding course, as a freshman. But Gil-Gonzalez, who wants to be a surgeon or a lawyer, said she got over her apprehension.
“You just have to apply yourself,” she said.
Keilo “Kenny” Xayavong is taking his first college class, in math, this year as a sophomore at High Tech Early College. A fan of criminal justice shows, Xayavong also hopes to practice law.
“I am interested in college courses because it’ll help me prepare for college when I transfer and understand what professors will expect of me,” said Xayavong, who added that so far, his class is “pretty easy.” “My parents won’t have to pay so much money for me to go to college, as well.”