A TEACHER'S PERSPECTIVE ON THE CHALLENGES AND REWARDS OF TEACHING A DUAL-CREDIT EARTH SCIENCE HIGH SCHOOL CLASS

For 14 years, Geology faculty from the California State University in Bakersfield (CSUB) have supported a year-long dual-credit physical geology class taught by Pamela Knight at South High School in Bakersfield. High school students successfully completing the class receive five units of university credit through CSUB’s “early enrollment” program. The possibility of earning college credit attracts top college-bound students into the class. Due to the lack of an Advanced Placement earth science class, these students would normally not take a geology or earth science class.

Steve Kiouses is another Kern High School District teacher with a graduate degree in geology. He worked for five years at Stockdale High School in Bakersfield during which he unsuccessfully tried to offer a similar class there. Three years ago, he transferred to Ridgeview High School, another high school within the district, and with support from an enlightened administrative staff was able to offer the geology class. To date, Ridgeview has conducted two years of geology. The class scheduled for 2011/2012 year is already full and has a 40 student waiting list.

All three schools are part of the same district, the Kern High School District. We will examine the factors that facilitated the classes at South and Ridgeview High Schools, and the obstacles encountered at Stockdale High School. We will examine the attitudes and perceptions of school site and district administrators, other teachers, and parents towards these classes. We will also look at challenges like curriculum development, funding, prerequisites, scheduling, student ability, and availability of qualified teachers. Based upon our experiences from success and failure we will ultimately present some ideas to help other high schools overcome the challenges presented by dual-credit courses.