Students from seven high schools local to WKU’s Glasgow campus will soon have the opportunity to get a jump on their college education thanks to a newly unveiled program.

“Early College at WKU in Glasgow,” announced at the campus’s 20 year celebration of its Hilltopper Way location on Thursday morning, will offer Colonnade courses to juniors and seniors in high school along with profession-specific classes.

According to Derick Strode, director of WKU’s regional campuses, 100 juniors will be accepted into the program in the fall of 2023, with an additional 100 juniors joining in 2024 to set the number of students to 200.

WKU President Timothy Caboni said the program is part of an “aggressive strategy to increase enrollment by targeting local students who would not otherwise attend college,” as well as a way to reach students who may think the cost of a college degree is beyond their reach.

“The challenge for us remains clear – the data reflect that nearly half of the students from the seven high schools closest to our WKU Glasgow campus are choosing not to attend college anywhere, with many of those students citing financial concerns as the primary reason,” Caboni said.

Caboni said the profession-specific courses available to students come from five broad sections of education that are directly connected to areas of need in the region – agriculture, business management, crime and legal studies, education and nursing.

Students will earn 15 credit hours during their junior year of high school and another 15 during senior year for a total of 30.

“What this means is that students in this program will graduate from high school not only celebrating their high school achievements, but also celebrating the completion of one full year of WKU coursework at graduation,” Caboni said.

Students will take coursework at the Glasgow campus in the mornings before returning to their respective high schools in the afternoons. Students will also embark on a pair of field trips each semester, one to meet with professionals in their chosen field and another to visit WKU’s Bowling Green campus.

The seven local high schools involved with the program are Allen County-Scottsville, Barren County, Caverna, Glasgow, Hart County, Metcalfe County and Monroe County. Students must apply during the winter of their 10th grade year and hold a GPA of 3.5 or higher.

Degree-seeking students will be eligible to reap the benefits of WKU’s Hilltopper guarantee, which covers 100% tuition for Kentucky first-time freshmen who qualify for Pell Grants with at least a 3.0 cumulative unweighted high school GPA.

More information about the new program can be found here.

Co-Editor-in-Chief Jake Moore can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @Charles_JMoore.