Less is more: Leveraging the power of de-implementation to drive excellence in education
March 2026
Strengthening dual enrollment partnerships
Key Points
- Dual enrollment gives high school students the opportunity to take college classes and helps them prepare for college.
- Offering dual enrollment requires a great deal of coordination between the institutions of higher education (IHEs) and the districts and/or high schools.
- With support from New Jersey’s Opportunity Meets Innovation Challenge grant, three IHEs established dual enrollment partnerships.
- All three IHEs established strong partnerships with memoranda of understanding, named contacts at each organization, and clear communication practices.
- Dual enrollment courses must be taught by qualified staff, and each partnership developed strategies to help high school teachers become qualified.
- Each partnership recruited and supported students throughout their dual enrollment course taking.
Abstract
Dual enrollment, also known as dual credit, allows students to take college courses during high school. Studies have shown that dual enrollment has a positive impact on students’ educational attainment. However, dual enrollment is complicated to implement given that it requires a partnership between a high school or district and a postsecondary educational institution. This research brief summarizes lessons learned from an evaluation of three dual enrollment partnerships in New Jersey. The evaluation found that the numbers of dual enrollment course offerings, qualified teachers, and students earning dual credit increased over 2 years. The implementation evaluation identified key components that should be in place for an effective dual enrollment program to succeed.
© 2026 RTI International. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
