The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, along with Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Ford Foundation, and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, is funding the Early College High School Initiative. The 13 partner organizations are creating or redesigning more than 250 pioneering small high schools. Jobs for the Future coordinates the Early College High School Initiative and provides support to the partners and to the effort as a whole. Originally called the Excel program, the Early College High School Initiative at LaGuardia Community College allows students to take college courses while attending one of the two early college high schools on the LaGuardia campus: the International High School or the Middle College High School. Early college is an accelerated program leading to a combined high school diploma and an Associates degree in five years. The educational goals of this initiative are to minimize the barriers between high school and college; to ease the transition from secondary to postsecondary school; to prepare the students for and attract them to higher education, and to increase the high school graduation rates. Not only does this initiative allow secondary school students to take classes on a college campus, it also offers them access to the entire campus and all of its facilities. It is an opportunity for them to learn first-hand the responsibilities and rewards of being a college student. This initiative is described in this document. (Contains 1 table.)