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Berea College

101 Chestnut St, Berea, KY

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Berea College, founded in 1855, charges no tuition to any student, funding the entire cost of every student's education through its endowment and a mandatory campus work-study program in which every student works at least 10 hours a week in a job tied to the college's operations, a model unlike that of almost any other accredited American college. The college was founded with an explicit dual mission of educating students regardless of race or gender at a time, in the pre-Civil War South, when that commitment was both unusual and legally contested, and Berea was forced to become briefly segregated under Kentucky state law before regaining its integrated admissions policy decades later. Berea's admissions process specifically prioritizes low-income students, particularly from the Appalachian region surrounding the college, reflecting its founding mission of providing access to higher education for students who otherwise couldn't afford it, regardless of their academic background. The college's combination of a genuinely tuition-free education, a mandatory labor program tied directly to the institution's operations, and its specific mission serving Appalachian and low-income students has made Berea one of the most distinctive colleges in the country, unlike nearly any other American higher education institution's funding and admissions model.

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