Dual enrollment and multilingual English learners: From equity gaps toward solutions

Multilingual English learners (MELs) represent 10.4% of P‐12 students and are the fastest‐growing group of students in the United States. Another quickly growing student population are those dual enrolled (DE) in high schools and community colleges. DE increased 7% annually between 2002 and 2011, and increased by 11.5% from fall 2021 to fall 2022 to 1.4 million. However, MELs are less likely to participate in DE. Furthermore, there is scant research on the causes and impacts of this disparity. This lack of participation presents a problem of equity, systemic/strategic enrollment management, and socio‐economic outcomes of education. The authors review gaps, discuss a recent high school‐community college partnership that welcomes MELs into DE, and make recommendations for research, policy, and practice