Early College Academy

Early College Academy (ECA) is a dropout prevention program focusing on re-engaging students residing in Franklin and its contiguous counties. The ECA program is for students who are credit deficient and were not successful in traditional school settings, but want to earn a high school diploma. The program will allow:

• All ECA students the opportunity to earn a high school diploma based on his or her credit needs;
• Students to participate in learning communities of 15-25 for a successful high school completion and experience;
• Students to take required foundation courses which include reading, writing, math, college survival and success course, and career exploration;
• Every ECA student to complete required Individualized Graduation Plan (IGP) which will define their personal goals and develop an educational plan leading to graduation;
• Qualified ECA students to participate in College Credit Plus program.

CAYCI has partnered with ECA to:

• support infrastructure development, assessment and progress-monitoring and program design related to student services and school climate;
• provide service personnel, specifically three student interns from the College of Social Work at The Ohio State University to support program development and service delivery; and,
• implement professional development opportunities for ECA staff focused on solution-focused schools, innovations in student support, and supporting student learning.

Annually, the CAYCI Team works to:

• Partner with community businesses to raise money for the men’s basketball team.
• Host social-emotional learning activities, implement trauma-informed care professional development trainings for staff, and partner in the community to offer prosocial activities such as yoga, prom, dances, clubs (chess, girls group, cheer/dance teams, etc.)
• In addition, the CAYCI Team intervenes to address attendance concerns among students and develops innovative tracking and incentive programs to encourage students to persist and graduate from high school.

To learn more about ECA, visit their website: Early College Academy (earlycollegecolumbus.com)