Work colleges are colleges in the United States that require students to work and integrate that work into the college learning experience. A work college is a public or private non-profit, four-year degree-granting institution with a commitment to community service. To qualify for Federal designation as a work college, at least half of the full-time students, including all students who reside on campus, must participate in a "comprehensive work-learning-service" program as an essential and core component of their educational programs, regardless of their academic program or their financial need.
Students typically work 6 to 15 hours per week while enrolled. Their compensation helps offset the cost of tuition, and student labor can lower operational costs. Work Colleges differ from need-based forms of financial support such as Federal Work Study, because students cannot "buy" their way out of the work requirement; participation is part of the educational experience. Students are regularly assessed on their work performance, and can be dismissed from the institution for non-performance. Students typically work on campus, though some work colleges allow students to work at off-campus jobs.
Currently, there are nine federally recognized work colleges in the Work College Consortium, meeting the requirements for operation as overseen by the U.S. Department of Education.
Work College Consortium
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*Alice Lloyd College
Alice Lloyd College is a private work college in Pippa Passes, Kentucky. It was co-founded by the journalist Alice Spencer Geddes Lloyd (a native of Cambridge, Massachusetts) and June Buchanan (a native of New York City) in 1923, at first und ...
in Pippa Passes, Kentucky
Pippa Passes is a home rule-class city located along Caney Fork in Knott County, eastern Kentucky, United States. Its formal name was chosen to honor benefactors of Alice Lloyd College. Residents commonly call the community "Caney" or "Caney Cre ...
*Berea College
Berea College is a private liberal arts work college in Berea, Kentucky. Founded in 1855, Berea College was the first college in the Southern United States to be coeducational and racially integrated. Berea College charges no tuition; every adm ...
in Berea, Kentucky
Berea is a home rule-class city in Madison County, Kentucky, in the United States. The town is best known for its art festivals, historic restaurants and buildings, and as the home to Berea College, a private liberal arts college. The population ...
* Bethany Global University in Bloomington, Minnesota
* Blackburn College in Carlinville, Illinois
Carlinville is a city and the county seat of Macoupin County, Illinois, United States. It is also the home of Blackburn College, a small college affiliated with the Presbyterian church, and the former home of Prairie Farms Dairy.
As of the 202 ...
* College of the Ozarks in Point Lookout, Missouri
* Kuyper College in Grand Rapids, Michigan
Grand Rapids is a city and county seat of Kent County, Michigan, Kent County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the city had a population of 198,917 which ranks it as the List of municipalities in Mi ...
*Paul Quinn College
Paul Quinn College (PQC) is a private historically black Methodist college in Dallas, Texas. The college is affiliated with the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME). It is the oldest historically black college west of the Mississippi River ...
in Dallas, Texas
Dallas () is the third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County wi ...
* Sterling College in Craftsbury Common, Vermont
*Warren Wilson College
Warren Wilson College (WWC) is a private liberal arts college in Swannanoa, North Carolina. It is known for its curriculum that combines academics, work, and service as every student must complete a requisite course of study, work an on-campus ...
in Asheville, North Carolina
Predecessor
A predecessor of the work college is the Manual labor college
A manual labor college was a type of school in the United States, primarily between 1825 and 1860, in which work, usually agricultural or mechanical, supplemented academic activity.
The manual labor model was intended to make educational opportuni ...
movement of the 1820s up to 1860, approximately. It also combined work, usually agricultural or mechanical, with preparatory or college study, often preparation for the ministry. Although it helped students financially, equally if not more important were the work's perceived healthful effects on the bodies and minds of the students. To see physical work as bodily and psychologically beneficial was at the time a relatively new idea.
See also
* Manual labor college
A manual labor college was a type of school in the United States, primarily between 1825 and 1860, in which work, usually agricultural or mechanical, supplemented academic activity.
The manual labor model was intended to make educational opportuni ...
* Deep Springs College
* Land-grant university
A land-grant university (also called land-grant college or land-grant institution) is an institution of higher education in the United States designated by a state to receive the benefits of the Morrill Land-Grant Acts, Morrill Acts of 1862 and ...
References
{{Work Colleges Consortium
Types of university or college
college
A college ( Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...
Internships
Education finance in the United States