MICROCOLLEGE
MOVEMENT
Small is Beautiful
Thoreau College is a leader in an emergent movement dedicated to the renewal and revitalization of higher education through the creation of new humanly-scaled, place-based, meaning-centered institutions with holistic curricula known as microcolleges.
Found in diverse locales, these institutions tend to incorporate several common features: intimate student bodies, the inclusion of student labor, the limiting of technology in favor of face-to-face interactions, student self-governance, experiential and discussion-based academic courses, a strong connection to place, and an emphasis on the holistic development of the student as a unique individual. Several microcollege initiatives draw their inspiration from Deep Springs College, which was far ahead of its time as a microcollege with about 26 students established in 1917. In actively synthesizing the manual, the intellectual, and the social, these colleges seek to re-create post-secondary education as a place where, as founder L.L. Nunn wrote of Deep Springs, students go not “to find either absolute truth or absolute wisdom, but to think, to read, to grow, and above all, to securely establish the one and only purpose which can justify man’s existence.”
The microcollege movement might be mistaken as simply proposing an eccentric, alternative model to big box universities; rather, it is part of a significant inquiry into what and how we should learn. As a movement, it is a fledgling one and still in the process of self-definition. Some are explicitly Nunnian, while others draw inspiration from prominent thinkers, stress social entrepreneurship, or seek to respond directly to ecological concerns of the present time. Some retain fundamental liberal arts structuring — others are conspicuously attempting to shirk these forms. That said, fundamentally, the initiative is about cultivating spaces, communities, and networks of learning in which students can meaningfully confront the existential question William James once posed: What makes a life significant?
Microcollege Directory:
Deep Springs and Deep Springs-inspired programs:
Deep Springs College – Deep Springs, California
Tidelines Institute – Gustavus, Alaska
Outer Coast – Sitka, Alaska
Gull Island Institute – Falmouth, Massachusetts
Anthroposophically-inspired programs:
Camphill Academy – Multiple sites in the United States
The International Youth Initiative Project – Järna, Sweden
The Goetheanum Studium – Dornach, Switzerland
Free Columbia – Philmont, New York
The Pfeiffer Center Biodynamic Course – Chestnut Ridge, New York
A few other microcollege projects:
Seguinland Institute – Georgetown, Maine
Suna Barichara – Barichara, Colombia
College for Social Innovation – Boston, Massachusetts
Flagstaff College – Flagstaff, Arizona
Sterling College – Craftsbury Common, Vermont
PlaceCorps – Kingston, New York
Bard’s Microcollege Initiative – Multiple locations
Springhouse Community School – Floyd, Virginia
Schumacher College – Totnes, England, UK
Kotowari – Japan
Nour Holistic Education – Egypt
Great Lakes Institute – Ontario, Canada
Lo-Fi Language Microcollege – Denver, Colorado
Bennett College – Greensboro, North Carolina
Mount Liberty College – Murray, Utah
Articles about microcolleges:
Distinctive Pedagogies that Address the “Meaning Crisis” in Higher Education: Case Studies from Microcolleges and “Living-Learning” Institutes
The Free Press: What’s the Opposite of Harvard? A Year of Honest Work
Holistic Education Review – The Gap Year Frontier
Voices with Vervaeke YouTube Channel: Holistic & Intergenerational Learning
Arizona Daily Sun: Big Idea: College on a ‘micro’ scale
NYTimes article on the microcollege movement
The Arete Project on NPR
Yes! Magazine: Why We Need Tiny Colleges
Washington Post: As enrollment falls and colleges close, a surprising number of new ones are opening
La Crosse Tribune: Thoreau College in Viroqua ‘in the right place’ during the pandemic
