Dual Enrollment as a Critical Pragmatist Endeavor

• In Event: Critical Pragmatism, Tensions, Limits, and Activism: Contemporary Expressions of Deweyan Scholarship

Abstract

In this paper, we look at the curricular reform known as dual enrollment (DE) in the United States, where high school students enroll in tertiary courses and earn credits while simultaneously earning high school credit toward graduation requirements. While Deweyan educational scholarship finds fault in educational reforms based on market-based logics of choice and individual pursuit of achievement (Author, 2018), we assert that reforms like DE can be understood as very much aligned with a critical pragmatist vision of education. We use a Deweyan experiential perspective to assert the importance of DE in educational practice at the secondary level, where more flexible, interest-based choices in curriculum can be limited by political and budgetary factors.

Authors

• Dustin Hornbeck, University of Memphis

• Kathleen Knight-Abowitz, Miami University (OH)