Vicki Schlum-Hughes – Discussed dual enrollment (DE) and asked the board to refrain from accepting the articulation agreement with PHSC for now. For the last two years, enrolling students in the program is a paper/pen method which takes time from students requiring guidance or mental health assistance. She illustrated the amount of work involved with a stack of papers about 12 inches high that had been recently completed, stating that this was only a portion of applications. “We are not employed by PHSC. We should not have to take away (from) our students to do their work.”
Stratton stated the articulation agreement had already been approved. The matter before the board was only the portion related to collegiate high school. Another meeting with PHSC is scheduled for January 2019. Stratton stated he would like to meet with Schlum-Hughes to discuss the paperwork so he can be prepared for the meeting in January.
Prescott asked how many students are dual enrolled, and the number of students represented by the stack of papers Schlum-Hughes shared. Of the 400 students Schlum-Hughes assists, she said she the papers represented approximately 100 students. As the 11th grade guidance counselor, she has the majority of DE students.
Each of the multiple sessions she has with a student can take up to 45 minutes, Schlum-Hughes said. She has met with some students as many as seven times. The PHSC process is for a student to decide what classes he/she wants, which may or may not be available at the time the paperwork is completed and fill out the class request list for submission. If the class is full, or not available, the process begins again as if the student had never requested a class.
Previously, the student went to the campus in person and met with an advisor to select classes and enroll. It generally took one meeting since they could see all the available classes in real time. Since the burden has shifted to the guidance counselors at the high school level, traffic at the college on enrollment days is nonexistent for high school students. “Their ‘game changer’ has become our nightmare,” Schlum-Hughes said. She recommended that PHSC follow the DE class registration format used by the University of Florida since test scores are online.
Stratton asked John Morris, Supervisor of Secondary Programs, for input on the agreement the board would discuss. The collegiate articulation agreement would allow students to earn a Career and Professional Education (CAPE) certification or associate in arts/associate in science degree if they are dual enrolled full time as a high school student and fulfill the requirements for 30 college credit hours. The concerns raised by Schlum-Hughes will be part of a larger discussion with PHSC over the next few months, he said.
She said the guidance counselors are being forced to do work that was not written in a previous articulation agreement. They have no choice, she said, so the students can participate in the DE program. The new agreement contains the language that guidance counselors will shoulder the entire responsibility for enrollment.
