The School That Works

At Blackburn, student labor keeps tuition down and grades up

It is a typical day at Blackburn College in rural Carlinville, Ill. At 6:30 a.m. a dozen sleepy students straggle to the kitchen of the Allison dining hall, where they will cook and serve more than 350 breakfasts for their classmates. By 8 a.m. other students are sorting the campus mail, collecting the trash or mortaring concrete blocks in a 52-ft. wall at the college's new handball court. By 11 a.m. still others are sweeping out the dormitories, trimming trees and shrubs, and feeding reels of magnetic tape into the college's computerized record system.

The workers are not scholarship students with campus jobs. As Blackburn Development Director John Perry puts it: "I don't care if your family is going to give us a million dollars, you've still got to work 15 hours a week." At Blackburn, a small private liberal arts college named for the Rev. Gideon Blackburn, who helped found the school in 1837, all 525 students are required to work. Previous generations of students, in fact, built nine of the 16 campus buildings, the brick walls, foundations and roofs.

Since students work without pay, Blackburn saves about $1.2 million a year, mostly in construction and maintenance. But there are other savings. Says Blackburn Treasurer Roger Carothers: "We have a highly intelligent work staff that retires every four years, without pension." The savings are passed on to the students in the form of lower college fees. Blackburn still charges only $3,500 per year, including all fees--the lowest private college tuition in Illinois. While other colleges fear enrollment declines due to cutbacks in federal aid and a shrinking college-age population, the student body at low-priced Blackburn has more than held its own in the past five years. Says President John Alberti, who expects an increase in applications next year too: "A drastic cut in federal student aid could be a boon to us."

The Blackburn work program was designed in 1913 to help youngsters from the surrounding farm land afford a college education. In those days the college operated a potato farm and dairy; students lived in old railroad coaches while constructing the campus. Today the college draws students from all over the Midwest, including Chicago and St. Louis. With its low operating costs and an endowment of $12 million, Blackburn offers substantial financial aid to more than 80% of its students. These days, in fact, the work program is often used not merely for economy but as a character builder and educational aid. Says History Professor John Forbes: "There is a tremendous experience of being responsible." Adds a school administrator: "If one student throws paper on the ground, the next student will say, 'Hey, I'm the one who is going to have to pick that up.' "

Blackburn is self-consciously democratic. There are no fraternities or sororities, and the work program is run by an elected committee of 13 students. Though attempts are made to share rough chores fairly and to match students to tasks they prefer, the pressure grows too great for some: the dropout rate among first-year students at Blackburn is a moderately high 33%, some of it due to dislike of work, academic and otherwise. In addition to attending classes and meeting their quota of chores, students are expected to spend 30 hours weekly in course preparation outside the classroom. Sixty percent of Blackburn's freshmen were in the top third of their high school classes. A respectable 28% of seniors enter graduate school. The number of graduates who go on to earn Ph.D.s from top schools is high enough to rank Blackburn among the top 123 private liberal arts colleges in the U.S. And over the years the work ethic has paid off handsomely after graduation. Though Blackburn is a farm land college, many of its alumni have done exceptionally well in the world of business. And most think their success owes something to all that hard work down on the campus. Says Blackburn Dean Arthur Darken: "We see it as a way to develop students for effective careers."

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