Giving Compass' Take:

• Amelia Harper, writing for Education Dive, reports that high schoolers need more options such as dual-enrollment opportunities and AP course offerings to prepare for college. 

• How can high schools change their curricula to accommodate student needs? What are the barriers to adding AP and dual-enrollment courses?

• Read about the inequitable access to advanced courses. 

Improved and consistent dual-enrollment opportunities, Advanced Placement (AP) course offerings in high school or by allowing these students to skipping the senior year altogether are among the easier pathways to college that should be available for the nearly one in four juniors who has already met all four ACT college benchmarks, according to a new report from Education Reform Now and the Alliance for Excellent Education, The 74 reports.

Almost a third of these qualifying students are eligible for Pell grants and almost another third are eligible for subsidized loans, so schools should take those needs into account either by putting students on a track that allows them to earn a year of college credit for free while in high school or by offering a substantial scholarship to a state school for the first year of college, if students choose to skip their senior year, the study suggests.

With the rising cost of college, gaining as many credits as possible in high school is a smart way to cut down on higher education expenses and debt. AP classes offer one way to accomplish this, though access to these courses are often limited in some areas.

Read the full article about college-ready high schoolers by Amelia Harper at Education Dive.