Abstract:
Supporters of concurrent enrollment programs tout its many benefits to students, parents and involved institutions; however, findings from related studies vary widely. Limited research has been conducted within colleges of agriculture to explore this concept. As more and more students enter college having earned a substantial number of college credits while concurrently completing their secondary education, it is essential to determine the value of such experiences. To that end, the purpose of this study was to explore the suggested value of prior college credits in relationship to student performance, retention, and degree completion in college. The population for this study consisted of entering college freshmen (1998) in the College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources at the University of Missouri. Findings revealed that students who began college with prior college credit did experience greater academic performance during their first year of college than students who entered with no prior credit. A relationship was also found between the number of prior college credits and academic retention and degree completion in college. Finally, a small amount of unique variance in academic performance could be accounted for by prior college credits when controlling for high school core grade point average and ACTscore.
Keywords:
freshmen, concurrent enrollment programs
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