Running Start
Running Start is a great opportunity to earn college credit and some students even finish a two-year Associate degree by the end of senior year! However, there are a few things to consider when determining if Running Start is right for you:
- Are you ready to be in an adult learning environment? Running Start students take classes with the general population at the community college- they are not special classes just for high school students. This means you’ll be in class with other Running Start students, recent high school graduates, people in their 20’s, 30’s, 40’s and older!
- Are you able to self-motivate and practice good time management? College classes run at a different pace from the high school. Each quarter, you are earning a year’s worth of high school credit! This allows you the potential to earn more credit than what is needed to graduate high school, but also means you are doing a year’s worth of work in 11 weeks at the college.
- Are you ready to “work” a part time or full time job being a college student? The general rule of college is that for every credit hour you are enrolled, expect 1-2 hours of work that you will be doing on your own time. For a typical five credit college course, this means you’ll have five hours a week that you are in class and then 5-10 hours of work you are doing on your own time (completing homework assignments, reading, studying for tests and quizzes, working on projects, etc.) This means if you are doing full time Running Start, you are “working” a full time job that can take up to 30 hours of your time each week! You will need to prioritize accordingly to make sure you have the time to dedicate to your college studies based on how many credits you plan to take.