A Colorado mom and early college advocate is working to educate the community about how to earn a debt-free college degree while still attending high school.
“The major concern for me was that I graduated with significant student loan debt, and I did not want that for my kids. And it is way worse today. And so I wanted to make sure that we were preparing them for college in a way that they would be able to afford it and not graduate college with the amount of debt that I graduated with,” Shelley Branine said.
9.5 million student loan borrowers have defaulted on repaying those loans recently, according to a PBS NewsHour report.
Branine said taking advantage of a state program can save Colorado families thousands of dollars.
“In Colorado we have a program called concurrent enrollment where you can actually take college classes while in high school, and so my kids were actually able to do that, and they graduated high school with associate degrees, and it cost us nothing,” Branine.
Branine said the program is often called dual enrollment in other states.
“The beauty of Colorado and this particular program that is available to everyone and that it really is the two birds with one stone method. You take high school classes and college classes at the same time and earn credit for both,” Branine said.
Branine said the program is not the same as Advanced Placement or AP courses, or college-level courses offered to high school students.
“AP is completely different, and honestly, I have a love-hate, mostly hate relationship with AP because kids, only about one in five students are going to earn full college credit for an AP class. With this particular program, concurrent enrollment, any student, if they earn a C or better, they get full college credit for that,” Branine said.
“One of my daughters, actually has a disability and has always required support with academics. And she graduated from college before she finished high school, so it is for everyone, not just certain kids.”
Branine said after her daughters earned associate degrees, they went on to earn bachelor’s degrees.
“They graduated college with zero debt. My youngest daughter graduated with $10,000 in the bank, a car she paid for with cash, and no student loan debt. And that was largely because of the concurrent enrollment in Colorado,” Branine said.
Branine is now teaching other parents and families about concurrent enrollment with her Amazon bestseller and New York Times Big Book Award-winning book Finish College in High School: The Family Guide to a Debt-Free Degree with Dual Enrollment.
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