{"id":22028,"date":"2014-05-13T06:30:44","date_gmt":"2014-05-13T10:30:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/?p=22028"},"modified":"2014-05-12T14:49:07","modified_gmt":"2014-05-12T18:49:07","slug":"how-some-south-florida-teenagers-got-college-degrees-before-high-school-diplomas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/2014\/05\/13\/how-some-south-florida-teenagers-got-college-degrees-before-high-school-diplomas\/","title":{"rendered":"How Some South Florida Teenagers Got College Degrees Before High School Diplomas"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_22029\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 280px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Reinaldo Camacho finished his two-year degree from Miami Dade College while he was still in high school. He's the first member of his family to pursue post-secondary education.\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2014\/05\/CAMACHOcrop_0.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-22029\" alt=\"Reinaldo Camacho finished his two-year degree from Miami Dade College while he was still in high school. He's the first member of his family to pursue post-secondary education.\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2014\/05\/CAMACHOcrop_0.jpg\" width=\"280\" height=\"262\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Mater Academy<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Reinaldo Camacho finished his two-year degree from Miami Dade College while he was still in high school. He&#39;s the first member of his family to pursue post-secondary education.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Sixty students from the Hialeah area will graduate from high school this month like thousands of others in Florida, but these students have done something especially remarkable.<\/p>\n<p>They\u2019ll receive their high school diplomas almost a month\u00a0<em>after<\/em>\u00a0graduating from Miami Dade College.<\/p>\n<p>The students took advantage of the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mdc.edu\/asa\/dual_enrollment.asp\" target=\"_blank\">dual-enrollment programs<\/a>\u00a0offered at Mater Academy and Mater Lakes Academy. These are publicly funded charter schools that operate independently of the district.<\/p>\n<p>Both campuses have large immigrant populations.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re located in Hispanic, working-class, low-income neighborhoods in Miami,\u201d says Lynn Norman-Teck with the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/floridacharterschools.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Florida Consortium of Public Charter Schools<\/a>. \u201cSo the administrators really started pushing dual enrollment more as a cost saving program for these kids because they could get a lot of college credits out of the way.\u201d\u00a0<!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-22028-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2014\/05\/DUALGRADS0509WR_web.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2014\/05\/DUALGRADS0509WR_web.mp3\">https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/files\/2014\/05\/DUALGRADS0509WR_web.mp3<\/a><\/audio><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Classes at Miami Dade College are free to eligible students from any high school who want to participate in dual enrollment.<\/p>\n<p>18-year-old Reinaldo Camacho began college courses before he started 10th\u00a0grade.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt was basically a lot of school work, a lot of things to juggle also because of the clubs that I was in,\u201d Camacho said. \u201cIt was difficult, but it wasn\u2019t impossible. The teachers were very flexible with me. Everyone was really there to support me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Camacho managed the course load along with school activities, volunteer tutoring, and his parents\u2019 divorce.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt really is a lot of work, but it\u2019s not impossible despite whatever difficulties or struggles you\u2019re going through, \u201d Camacho said.\u00a0\u00a0He is the first in his family to go to college. He\u2019s heading to Hamilton College in New York as a junior on full scholarship. He wants to be a lawyer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sixty students from the Hialeah area will graduate from high school this month like thousands of others in Florida, but these students have done something especially remarkable. They\u2019ll receive their high school diplomas almost a month\u00a0after\u00a0graduating from Miami Dade College. The students took advantage of the\u00a0dual-enrollment programs\u00a0offered at Mater Academy and Mater Lakes Academy. These [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15],"tags":[1012],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22028"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22028"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22033,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22028\/revisions\/22033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/florida\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}