Cognitive and Non-Cognitive College Readiness in Participants in Three Concurrent Enrollment Programs at a North Carolina Community College

This study’s purpose was to investigate the college readiness of students from three concurrent enrollment programs at a North Carolina community college. Groups included participants in the Huskins dual credit program, the non-Huskins dual enrollment program, the early college high school, a non-concurrently enrolled high school comparison group, and a regularly matriculated college comparison group. Cognitive college readiness variables included the percentage of Cs or better in college transfer courses and the number of acceptances into colleges at various degrees of entrance difficulty. Non-cognitive college readiness variables included commitment to education, self- and resource-management, interpersonal and social skills, academic success skills, and career planning skills. After controlling for age, ethnicity, gender, prior completion of college transfer courses, completion of remedial courses, and placement test scores, the Huskins and non-Huskins groups had significantly higher probabilities of Cs or better than the college comparison group. After controlling for age, ethnicity, gender, and pretest levels of the five non-cognitive college readiness variables, a combined group of Huskins and non-Huskins students had significantly higher self- and resource-management skills than the high school comparison group, and all three concurrent enrollment groups had significantly higher levels of career planning skills than the high school comparison group.