Purpose

This bill would expand access for high school students to take college courses, including during summer, through postsecondary institutions. It aims to define enrollment priorities, instructional limits, and student protections to facilitate early college opportunities while preserving program structure for online and summer options and for special groups like veterans.

Main Provisions

• Enrollment priority

  • Postsecondary institutions must give priority to their own postsecondary students when enrolling high school pupils (grades 10–12) in their courses.

• Information, recruitment, and advertising

  • Institutions may share information about their programs with secondary schools or with pupils and their parents. They may advertise or recruit secondary pupils on educational and programmatic grounds. A temporary exception existed for the 2014-15 through 2019-20 school years allowing recruitment of pupils in districts with 700+ students.

• Course eligibility for PSEO

  • Institutions may not enroll secondary pupils in remedial or other courses that are not college-level for purposes of postsecondary enrollment options, with an exception for students in certain middle or early college pathways (see below).

• Middle/early college exception

  • If a student eligible for the Graduation Incentives Program enrolls full time in a middle or early college program, those programs must be designed to allow dual high school and college credit and provide a clear path to a postsecondary degree or credential. In this case, the student receives developmental college credit (not college credit) for remedial work.

• No displacement

  • Once a pupil is enrolled in a postsecondary course under this section, they must not be displaced by another student.

• Veteran enrollment consideration

  • If a postsecondary institution enrolls a secondary pupil under this section, the institution must also enroll, in the same course, a veteran who qualifies under the relevant veteran statute if the veteran demonstrates that established enrollment timelines were not practicable for them.

• Online courses

  • Institutions must allow secondary pupils to enroll in online courses under this section in line with their policy for online postsecondary pupil enrollment.

• Summer courses

  • Institutions must allow secondary pupils to enroll in summer courses under this section in line with their policy for summer postsecondary pupil enrollment.

Changes to Existing Law (Significant Shifts)

• Prioritization framework

  • Codifies that postsecondary institutions must prioritize their own enrolled postsecondary students when admitting high school pupils.

• Restricted remedial/Developmental coursework

  • Tightens rules so that high school students cannot be enrolled in remedial or non-college-level courses for the purpose of postsecondary enrollment options, except within the structured middle/early college pathway described.

• Pathways to credit

  • Creates a defined pathway (middle/early college) that allows dual credit while ensuring appropriate developmental credit is received for remediation, aligning with a declared pathway toward a degree or credential.

• Veteran access and timelines

  • Adds a guardrail to ensure veterans have access when timelines are impractical, by requiring enrollment in the same course for a qualifying veteran.

• Online and summer enrollment

  • Explicitly requires that online and summer course enrollments be available to secondary pupils under the same policy framework as other postsecondary options.

• Advertising limitation context

  • Reiterates a limited historical allowance for recruitment in certain districts, indicating the bill’s alignment with programmatic and educational grounds rather than broad recruitment.

Relevant Terms - postsecondary institution - postsecondary students - pupils in grades 10-12 - dual high school and college credit - middle college program - early college program - remedial courses - developmental courses - college-level courses - graduation incentives program (section 124D68) - section 197447 (veterans) - enrollment timelines - online courses - summer courses - enrollment priority - advertisement/recruitment - districts with 700 students or more - online enrollment policy - summer enrollment policy