HomeLife Academy Partners with Jackson State for Middle College Offerings
HomeLife Academy (HLA), an umbrella school based in Jackson, Tennessee, has partnered with Jackson State Community College as one of more than 15 high schools across West Tennessee to provide Middle College offerings to its students. The Middle College partnership will allow home school students registered with HLA to earn an associate degree before they graduate high school. JSCC will hold a Middle College open house on Tuesday, May 13, 2025, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Jackson Campus for students and parents to learn more about the Middle College program.
“Working with area school officials, we’ve been able to expand our Middle College program to nearly all of our academic offerings, making it advantageous for all West Tennessee high school students that qualify to get a quality education and have a degree to their name before they graduate high school,” said Dr. Carol Rothstein, JSCC President. “This program is making it possible for students to graduate college early, reduce the amount of college debt they take on, and allowing them to get into their dream career sooner.”
Middle College allows high school students to enroll in college while in high school so they can earn a full college degree in tandem with their high school graduation requirements. Although Middle College offerings have been available to public school students for a few years, home school students had no partnering school, which would allow them to participate in that programming. JSCC is one of the first colleges to offer the opportunity to home school students.
Dual enrollment programming, which enables high school students to earn college credit they can transfer to a college or four-year institution upon graduation, is similar to Middle College. One major difference is the Middle College program enables students the opportunity earn a two-year degree and not just college credit. At high school graduation, many students have the education and skills to head directly into the workforce or continue post-secondary study with reduced time at a four-year institution.
JSCC has more than 300 Middle College students currently enrolled in the program. About 120 of them are expected to graduate this month. Students interested in enrolling in Middle College must be a junior or senior attending one of the participating schools, have a minimum 3.0 high school GPA, and enroll in 12 hours of courses. Rising juniors will be able to earn their degree prior to graduation and students enrolling as a senior will have the ability to carry their credits after graduation into their freshman year at JSCC to complete their degree. Middle College students receive $4,000 towards the cost of the degree.
Learn more about JSCC’s Middle College program and register to attend the open house.
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