A lot of people don’t know the differences between AP and Dual Enrollment courses.
AP courses are college level advanced classes. These courses can be taken in a high school without placement testing as long as the teacher signs off on it. Some popular examples on campus are AP Psychology, AP Human Geography, AP Biology, and AP U.S. History.
Dual Enrollment are actual college classes offered through Palm Beach State College. On campus, Santaluces offers college writing and college algebra. These courses require college ready scores in math and reading, plus a 3.0 cumulative GPA. Students can take the PERT, SAT, or SAT to earn college ready scores.
Not only are the settings of these courses different, but so are the overall ways you get your credits.
AP courses are year long with various tests, classwork, and projects. At the end of the year you have to take an AP assessment test. If you don’t pass the test you don’t get the college credit.
Dual Enrollment courses are one semester long (fall, spring, or summer). They’re usually 12-16 weeks long (unless they’re summer classes than they’re 6-8 weeks long). You usually only take a few tests that include midterms and finals. Most classes have a 2,000 word page essay that goes along with it. In order to get credit you have to at least pass the class with a “C”.
Some Dual Enrollment courses have more assignments than others. It all depends on the class and the professor. The same goes for AP classes; the work load and how rigorous the class is has to do with the course and the teacher.
In the end, you get college credits from both of these types of classes and both are worth the effort. It’s just a different way to approach earning college credits.
