Abstract
State and local educational leaders continue to focus on creating new programs that increase student achievement and college and career success. One such model has been the establishment of early college high schools that are innovative, supportive high schools that seek to incorporate a small school design with a focus on college-preparedness. Through a qualitative, cross-site case study a voice was given to early college high school teachers to provide teaching strategies to improve college-readiness in students. The researcher interviewed, observed, and received school documents from eight teachers at two early college high schools using a researcher developed interview protocol. The researcher used a comprehensive coding process to analyze data resulting in themes that included early college attributes, relationship building, student expectations, and deliberate teaching strategies for college-readiness. The data provided further subthemes creating a holistic, deliberate approach to education and should be considered for further implementation by a variety of educational stakeholders including, policymakers, district leaders, principals, teachers, post-secondary institutions, and university instructors. These advocates might adopt all or part of the ECHS teaching strategies depending on their role in education to increase student college achievement.|Keywords: Early college high schools, College readiness, Transformational Teaching