Some days she thinks it would be nice to start a clothing line or own a hair and nail salon. Other days she wants to become a professional singer and dreams of winning a spot on “American Idol.” Most of the time, however, Williams has no idea what she wants to be when she grows up. But at age 15, she is already well on her way to whatever career she chooses.

By the time she graduates from high school, Williams not only will have earned her high school diploma but will hold an associate’s degree, the equivalent of two years of college.

In a growing number of cities, including Chicago, public school districts are offering students an opportunity to work toward dual degrees as a means of curbing the staggering high school dropout rate and better preparing young people to compete in a global workforce. Such early-college programs are among the latest trends in school reform, targeting bright, mostly low-income students who were performing poorly in traditional schools and turning them into college scholars.

“This is changing my life in a lot of ways,” said Williams, a freshman at the Early/Middle College High School at Guilford Technical Community College. “I am getting a free college degree, and I will be way ahead of a lot of other kids.”

In North Carolina, the early-college program has been the centerpiece of a school reform movement started by Gov. Mike Easley three years ago. The governor has led efforts to provide every student an opportunity to go to college debt-free. In return, the state, which is rebuilding its workforce after the loss of manufacturing jobs in the last decade, will get a fresh pool of trained workers to fill the technical jobs coming to the state.

“High schools will be a relic of the past pretty soon. When you’ve got 40 percent of the students dropping out, they are not working. You have got to do something different,” Easley said. “We’re using high schools as satellite colleges, and we are giving people more incentive to stay there and work hard.”

A similar program, a joint effort between Chicago Public Schools and DeVry University, began three years ago. Last year, Chicago opened its first early-college school, DeVry University Advantage Academy High School, where students graduate with computer degrees from DeVry.

In many cases, such early-college programs have taken students who were on the way to becoming high school dropouts and turned them into high achievers at major universities. Of the 106 students who graduated from Chicago’s school last year with an associate’s degree, 96 decided to further their education by going to a four-year college to pursue bachelor’s degrees. The remaining 10 went to work in the fields for which they were trained.

As America moves toward an increasingly technological society, public school systems have been challenged to find ways to keep kids motivated enough to remain in school and to prepare them to compete in a global workforce that requires more than a high school diploma.

While many urban school districts, including Chicago’s, have grappled with a dropout epidemic, officials have sought to engage students in job-specific programs that enable them to focus on subjects they enjoy, from mechanics to nursing to culinary arts, while preparing them for careers.

“I am a firm believer that this is the answer,” said Jill Wine-Banks, officer for the Education to Careers program with the Chicago Public Schools. “A high school diploma does not get you anywhere in the global economy. To be competitive, you have to provide students with the minimum of a postsecondary education. This is a way for students to get it all while they’re in high school.”

Early-college programs, in which high schools are set up on junior college campuses, offer younger students an early taste of campus life while giving them a head start toward a degree. In addition to taking required high school courses, they take junior college courses.

A year ago, college was not in the cards for Jequetta Williams. Not only were her grades bad, but she was so wrapped up in the drama of middle school that nothing else seemed to matter. This year, she said, her options — and her attitude — have changed.

“I used to get straight F’s and I didn’t care. I wasn’t focused on school. I was thinking about other things,” said Williams, adding that she is still learning to control her talkative mouth and her temper. “Now I feel smart. I’m getting A’s and B’s and stuff.”

The school is designed to reflect the racial demographics of the state. And like most of the programs, its main targets are high-risk students — those who likely would fail without intervention.

Matthew Basden, 16, said he plans to own a restaurant some day, so he is working toward a culinary arts degree through Guilford. Had he not been accepted into the program, Basden, a sophomore, said he would have dropped out of high school.

“This is the best fit for me,” said Basden, who would be the first in his family with a college degree. “At regular high school, there is a lot of immaturity and gangs and stuff. I’m just not into that and I was tired of it. All I do now is work 30 or 40 hours a week and go to school. It’s the best way for me to keep sane.”

At Early/Middle College, Principal Tony Watlington says, students know they are expected to succeed. The school’s job is to give them the tools and support system to make it.

“Regardless of whether they have no money or whether there are one or two parents in the house, these kids can go to college, get a good job and have a share of the great economic pie,” Watlington said. “All we need is for the parents to send them to school with a good attitude and a good work ethic. Then it is our job to educate them.”

This fall, North Carolina plans to offer online early-education courses, enabling a larger number of students to participate. And if Easley has his way, North Carolina will be the first state in the nation to provide debt-free access to college.

After earning an early-college degree in high school, low-income students attending college will get an annual $4,000 grant from the state. That, coupled with Pell grants and lottery proceeds, will provide all but $3,500 of the approximately $13,000 a year that Easley says it costs to send a student to college in North Carolina.

“If you work 10 hours a week to make up the rest of it and keep your grades up, you can graduate debt-free,” Easley said. “But you’ve got to have some skin in the game too. This is not a free lunch.”

Paid for by the Mike Easley Committee