Getting ahead: students earn college credit while in high school
PHOTO: The Career Center offers advice and information on how to be best prepared for after high school.
By Rowan Reising
BlueDevilHUB.com Staff
A new program with Sacramento City College (SCC) has 50 students from Davis High, Da Vinci and Davis School for Independent Study earning college credit while still in high school.
This initiative is called the Hispanic-Serving Institution-Early College Program (HSI-ECP) which gives DHS students credit for both high school and college.
SCC applied for grant money for the first HSI-ECP in early 2020, but courses didn’t begin until the spring semester of 2022, delayed a bit due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Davis Joint Unified School District was the first high school district partner to enter a formal College and Career Access Pathway (CCAP) partnership with SCC.
According to Rosana Chavez-Hernandez, the director of the program, it has been very successful due to “amazing” student support specialists, resources provided to students, and surveys that improve the program by asking for student feedback.
“(There is) no miss in this,” said director of secondary education and leadership Troy Allen.
Even though the program is geared toward underserved students, specifically the Hispanic community, anyone can enroll as it is not exclusionary. Students can register by going to the SCC website (SCC.losrios.edu/HSI-ECP) and submitting their application and high school transcript.
“The soul of this project is to offer college access to our Latinx and disproportionately impacted students who may have never considered themselves college-going,” Chavez said in an email.
The need for this kind of support is evident in the current opportunity gaps between underserved and privileged communities, in terms of: “A-G readiness”, average California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) scores, high school completion and gaps in post-secondary school enrollment.
The free program aids students by speeding up the post-secondary school experience and making it less expensive since students have already attained credit for college-level courses during high school. Possible adverse effects include feeling overwhelmed while managing a sizeable workload and the associated stress.
“It is beyond what is required,” said Andrea Gaytan, dean of the Davis Center for SCC.
Every Monday, assignments open in Canvas, and students have the week to work on them before the portal closes every Sunday. The whole program is online, but some professors use Zoom to teach their classes, while others use it to hold office hours, providing students an opportunity to get one-on-one help.
Sophomore Camila Pastor, a Da Vinci student enrolled in the program, is taking “Intro to Administrative Justice” as she is interested in studying pre-law in the future.
“Knowing it gives me high school and college credits makes me feel good about myself,” Pastor said.
Pastor works on the assignments provided every other night for about 30 minutes, making the assignment workload “easy to handle.” She encourages all students to participate in the program because it provides more options than DJUSD.
Currently, SCC offers Introduction to Administration of Justice, Intro to Ethnic Studies, College Success and Nutrition to DHS students.
According to Student Support Specialist Amber Araiza, there are about 50 students currently enrolled in the HSI-ECP. SCC aims to continue the program and to expand community outreach, utilizing Instagram and its official website.
