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New York Times
There Are Better Ways to Do College
Work colleges teach students that communities need all their members to pick up a shovel and participate.
By Alice Lloyd
June 4, 2019
Most days I space out at some point and travel in my mind to a place
called Alice Lloyd College in Pippa Passes, Ky. It doesn’t hurt that
its founder and I, no relation, have the same name and that I happen to
have a postcard picture of its Appalachian campus pinned over my desk.
But Alice Lloyd lends itself to reverie. It’s one of those seemingly
miraculous communities that make something uncommonly close to full use
of all their members.
There are nearly 10 of them: Private four-year schools known as work
colleges, where students put in mandatory hours each week as a
complement to their course loads. Through a combination of grants,
donations, endowments and hourly wages, work colleges ask for less in
fees than any comparable schools and leave their graduates with lighter
debt loads. They also keep every student meaningfully occupied, in
roles that range from chaplain to dishwasher.
It’s almost too easy, once you’ve visited one of the campuses, to slip
into contemplation of what work colleges have that most of the rest of
life lacks. They serve a deeper need than affordable education. They
harness the power of purposeful work, compounded by collegiate social
pressure. (If the bathroom crew misses a shift, their dorm mates will
notice.)
They also do a great job of honoring their origins: Each one rose to
meet its area’s need for a college that students wouldn’t have to fund
in the conventional manner, and the model they landed on worked well
enough that relatively little has changed.
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