President's Welcome

Great to have you visiting the College Unbound website. If you are a prospective student, congratulations! Coming here is a step forward in finishing your degree.

If you are a current student or graduate, you know that by joining College Unbound you have joined a community committed to change, a family that supports each other, and a movement that will change who gets degrees in America and how we get them.

At CU we have created a space for adults who wanted to return to college and transform their lives, both personally and professionally. We know you come to CU with a vision for what you want. We want to help you realize that vision. We know you come to CU with years of knowledge and experience. We want to share that knowledge, and, whenever possible, credit your experience.

We often hear people worrying about whether their kids are college ready, but we think colleges need to learn to be student ready. That means seeing students for who they are and valuing the experiences and knowledge they bring with them to the classroom.

Over the last decade, College Unbound has gone from a dozen or so students to hundreds. College Unbound has successfully taken on every hurdle along the way, just as our students have had to take on every hurdle in their own lives. From Rhode Island Board of Higher Ed approval to Federal Financial Aid, to accreditation and expansion in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Illinois, we keep moving forward. College Unbound has set up a financially sound college with the potential to serve some of the over 36 million adults nationwide who started college and never finished. 

Poem Number Two on Bell’s Theorem, or The New Physicality of Long Distance Love
By June Jordan

 

There is no chance that we will fall apart
There is no chance
There are no parts.

 

We are excited to welcome you to College Unbound and hope you’ll take time to get to know us, the collaborative work we’ve done, and our shared vision for how when we learn together we can transform not just college but our larger world. 

 

The poem above is one of my favorites. A simple three lines by June Jordan about relationships, this poem's title references Bell's Theorem – a  posit on the nature of entanglement and the variables that link and affect us all. As we continue to work towards a college both for this moment and also for our shared future, those entanglements are critical to how we can imagine CU's future. They can also help us all think together about how to guide CU – as a place-based college without a single campus – in  the years ahead.  

 

We’ve been busy already in 2023! The College had its largest graduating class and Fall 2023 welcomes College Unbound students from Rhode Island, Philadelphia, and Chicago. There is still lots to do – and for us to learn to do better – as we work towards more fully embodying the values of our Strategic Plan and the needs of our students, our alumni, and one another. We will keep learning from one another.

 

In these days following the SCOTUS decisions on Affirmative Action and Student Loan Forgiveness, I am excited for the college to step further into advocacy work pushing not just for a more just higher education but, through that, a world with more equity and justice throughout. We will have a space to talk and scheme about the reach and national impact of CU at the Imagining America's National Gathering hosted by College Unbound October 20th-22nd in Providence, RI. Hope to see you there!