Twin Cities Experimental College starts summer semester

The Experimental College, a locally based free school, will begin offering summer classes this coming week.

For their summer semester, the ExCo will offer 35 classes on subjects that range from basic bike maintenance to anarchist theory. Classes are open to anyone of any age, free of charge, and are taught by people in the community who have special expertise or knowledge in particular areas.

The ExCo started at Macalester College in 2006, and spread to the University of Minnesota earlier this year. It tries to provide free classes on subjects of social justice and activism that academia often neglects. Imagine if they posted all these classes and information on their website in the form of accessible video or audio; an interesting way to expand the people they reach out to?

The ExCo is based on similar projects at elite private colleges like Oberlin, although the Twin Cities project differs because it doesn't offer college credit, and resides outside University departments as a community and student group.

I've yet to take an ExCo class, but it seems to be a pretty stable project that sometimes manages to reach past the student and activist ghettos that often seem to bog projects down in unrealistic dogma and theoretical gobbedlygook.

For more info, check out their website or an earlier article I worked on about them for the Daily.