- April 18, 2024
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Two dual-enrollment opportunities are in the works for Flagler County schools.
At the School Board workshop on Aug. 1, board members and representatives from Flagler Palm Coast High School discussed the renewing of the district’s dual-enrollment program with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. In addition, the Board discussed its options for the University of Florida dual-enrollment opportunity that was passed at the last meeting on July 18.
The greatest cost of the grant is actually the faculty cost, Board Member Colleen Conklin said of the agreement with Embry-Riddle.
Conklin said the grant covers all of the technical training, the industry certification exams, the curriculum, the travel for professional development, the equipment, the supplies and the curriculum.
And in an effort to create sustainability, Conklin said the best move would be for schools to credential their own teachers as opposed to bringing in someone with a qualified degree from outside of the district.
“We know at some point this grant is going to go away,” she said. “But nobody knows how this is going to flow. … So the idea was to open the door for the pipeline to see how this flows, how this is going to work. So if this grant were to go away, then that would be a sustainable item to continue to offer for kids.”
The program had about 45 students last year and is expected to have about 60 this year, according to FPC Principal Dusty Sims.
In a previous meeting, the Board passed an agreement that would allow Flagler’s high school students to dual enroll at UF but failed to establish criteria above what UF requires, Flagler Schools Curriculum Director Diane Dyer said.
According to Dyer, three options are available: to limit the program to just International Baccalaureate students, to include Matanzas AP students, as well as FPC students, or to make it available to any student who meets the requirements.
School Board Chairman Trevor Tucker said he wasn’t comfortable with the third option.
“I want every student who goes into there to be successful at the University of Florida,” he said. “Anytime they have any dual enrolled child, when they fail in that college course, we have not set them up for success. If we have students failing those, we didn’t screen them correctly or we didn’t give the supports along the way.”
Conklin strongly disagreed with the first option, voicing that it was “inappropriate” to only include IB students.
