“Where do you think your power comes from?” I asked the students in my concurrent enrollment high school class, which I teach as part of a Western Colorado University program. One of them, Francis, responded by saying power comes from students.
This wasn’t the first time Francis thought about power; my students had been studying Enlightenment philosophers like Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and the Baron de Montesquieu. Francis told us that when students at her school felt that lunch was too short, she and others protested. Only then did the principal listen and add 10 extra minutes. I beamed, thinking about how Frances had just been accepted into Brown University and was named a finalist for QuestBridge, which helps high-achieving students from low-income backgrounds get into top colleges and receive scholarships. She was going places—and I was providing the bridge to her future.
Francis is one of more than 51,300 Colorado students — roughly 20% of all public high schoolers — who take concurrent enrollment, or CE, courses each year in our state. These students concurrently take college courses for credit that are taught by a high school teacher like me in a high school setting.
Only 20% of Colorado’s high schools offer robust CE pathways, largely due to staffing shortages and credentialing barriers. Rural students are twice as likely to lack access to CE courses due to teacher shortages. Cost is a major obstacle for teachers pursuing CE credentials, as there is no dedicated state funding stream for certification coursework.
For Francis, who will have earned 12 college credits by graduation, CE is saving her money and a semester of college. Students who participate in CE are more likely to graduate high school, enroll in college, and complete postsecondary credentials. This is invaluable for her future. We can and need to do more to pave the way to college for students like her.
Strengthening partnerships between high schools and colleges is one solution. Instead of just a few select courses, schools could expand their partnerships with local colleges, allowing students like Francis to choose from a wide range of subjects. Concurrent enrollment students tend to embrace their courses, learning new things, gauging the future demands of higher education, and gaining an advantage when it comes time to apply for college.
My school, Denver School of Science and Technology, has partnered with Western Colorado University, one of the few institutions in the state that allows teachers with a master’s degree and 18 credit hours in the content area to be a teacher of record. This enables me to work as a university employee and record grades for the course. Strengthening these collaborative partnerships statewide, especially in areas with limited CE access, depends on certifying more high school teachers to teach these college-level courses.
I love teaching CE on my high school campus because it prepares my students to navigate academic and social discourse in college-level discussion groups — just one of the many skills they will need in college.
Another solution is to have more high school teachers of diverse backgrounds become certified to teach college-level courses, which would allow more students to take college classes in their own school building. Francis was able to see herself in college because I, like her, am a person of color. When we equip more teachers of diverse backgrounds to teach concurrent enrollment students, students gain a sense of belonging and motivation, which leads to higher test scores on Advanced Placement tests and college entrance exams, and—most importantly—increased aspirations for further education.
Expanding the Concurrent Enrollment Expansion and Innovation (CEEI) Grant Program, which provides grants to expand and innovate concurrent enrollment opportunities to qualified students, including assisting teachers with the cost of obtaining a graduate degree in a specific subject. I had a master’s degree when I was hired to teach CE; all teachers should have incentives to have the same opportunity.
Francis is now preparing to graduate from high school and start college next fall at Brown University, where she plans to major in biomedical engineering. She will be armed with the confidence she obtained in my CE political science class. She can think about Locke and smirk to herself, knowing that the power does rest with her. Let’s ensure more Colorado students like Francis have the chance to expand their horizons in concurrent enrollment courses.
Garfield Warren is a 10-11th grade AP World History and AP African-American Studies teacher at Denver School of Science and Technology-Green Valley Ranch High School in Denver. He is a 2024-2025 Teach Plus Colorado Charter Teacher Policy Fellow.
