The Wake

In the aftermath of the University of Minnesota workers’ strike, driven, socially-conscious people were left with a bitter taste in their mouths. The U of M chapter of the Experimental College, EXCO, of the Twin Cities has sprouted from this volatile mixture.
EXCO is an organization that helps organize free classes and demonstrates that there is an alternative path to education. The fact that learning can happen outside of an institutionalized context is almost counterintuitive at a time and place where knowledge is power - and that power is going to cost you.

The U of M’s EXCO chapter has “a principal of offering free education to the Twin Cities community,” according to Amy Pason, a U of M grad student who helps organize the U of M EXCO chapter. Anyone can take a class through EXCO and there are no tuition costs.

Experimental colleges are nothing new. EXCO is retro in its origins, which lie in the people power of the 60s. Oberlin College, which is generally considered to be the model for experimental colleges, began offering experimental classes in 1968. Oberlin is a highly selective private school in a smallish suburb just outside of Cleveland, OH. There, students started the experimental college as a vehicle for civic engagement within the community. The idea was to grant residents of the town more access to the happenings in the college. Eventually the experimental college was integrated into Oberlin’s regular curriculum.

At the time, EXCOs started popping up around the country. Unfortunately, within ten years, most had shut down their experiments.
In 2006, however, there was marked new growth in the movement as an experimental college sprouted out of a student group at Macalester. It all started after a significant raise in the cost of tuition. According to the EXCO Web site, the students started the organization “as an alternative to the inequalities and injustices of higher education…to offer the Twin Cities community the opportunity to teach or learn in a space open to alternative education.”

Currently, all chapters of EXCO in the Twin Cities are associated with a college or university. The U of M chapter is a bonafide student group, which means they have a bit of money and the ability to hold classes in campus buildings. Students who take and teach classes through EXCO may be able to get credits for their efforts.

However, there is a discussion among present EXCO organizers over how involved EXCO should be with the institutionalized university. “One of the reasons that we started EXCO is to recognize that the University of Minnesota as a state-public institution, it’s not necessarily that public,” Pason said.

What happens at the U of M, and most public universities, often stays there. The research rarely makes it into the public sphere. Every now and then a newspaper headline may grab hold of a charismatic research finding, but more often, benefits of academic endeavor remain largely inside the academic community.

Much of the U of M campus is designed so a student would never need to leave. Many people attending the U of M, especially undergraduates, never make it outside of campus and its surrounding student housing areas (think Dinkytown). Opening up the U of M would open resources to many community members, and open the real world to those stuck on campus.

“Even if we are a university-based official student organization and most of the people that take the classes are students, that’s not necessarily our long-term political goal,” said Arnoldas Blumberg, a U of M undergrad who also helps organize the U of M’s EXCO chapter. “We really want to sort of bridge the gaps between various communities around the Twin Cities.”

In the future, Twin Cities’ EXCOs have the potential to exist much more outside of institutions like the U of M.
Imagine an entire educational system organized by people in communities. Say you want to learn Spanish - rather than paying a grand to attend a university you could sign up for the EXCO Spanish class where you would meet other members from your community who speak the language. “We also are really working now on expanding the sort of community base,” Blumberg said, “seeing how EXCO can serve different community centers or grassroots organizations.”