He’s on the list for The Providence Journal’s 12 to Watch in 2012.

And he’s been chosen for Leadership Rhode Island’s 2012 Theta II class.

College Unbound @ Roger Williams University student Michael McCarthy has certainly taken Providence, Rhode Island by storm.

College Unbound congratulates Michael for this well-deserved recognition — We’re proud of the work you do and all of the learning it represents!

Here’s an excerpt from The Providence Journal story:

“Michael McCarthy got caught up in a chaotic Occupy Wall Street protest on the Brooklyn Bridge on Oct. 1 and found himself drawn into the movement.    McCarthy, a freelance animator, Afghan war veteran and social sciences student at College Unbound at Roger Williams University, says he grew up in Newport in the lower strata of the so-called disaffected ’99 percent.’   On Oct. 15, McCarthy joined more than 100 people who launched Occupy Providence in Burnside Park. Though the movement is by definition leaderless, McCarthy has emerged as an oft-quoted member, in print and on the airwaves.  Some have suggested he run for office, but McCarthy says that’s not what he’s about. [...]“  Read the full article here.

Housed as a residential program on Southern New Hampshire University’s campus, College Unbound @ SNHU students enjoy the benefits of living in a close learning community while also experiencing a unique context for their learning.

Students who complete all requirements for the degree receive a Bachelor of Arts in Integrated Studies.

Students develop customized learning plans beginning with their own goals and areas of interest, as well as their current abilities and struggles.

They gather for group seminars to collaborate and fulfill shared learning goals.

Off-campus internships and projects connect students’ ideas with community and industry needs, while also building their skills and knowledge.

A professional advisor, an academic coordinator, mentors, and peers guide students through an integrated curriculum of real-world learning, broad knowledge and personal development.

College Unbound @ SNHU students participate in a year-round, three-year program that includes travel and experiential learning experiences.

Since 2011, this program has been centered around an off-campus, non-residential program tailored to adult learners. College Unbound @ RWU students who complete all requirements for the degree receive a Bachelor’s of General Studies in approximately four years — or less if they enroll with credits from other institutions.

Most students range in age from their mid-20s to their mid-60s. They are interested in working independently but with personalized support and flexible scheduling.

Many students in this program use their current job as their professional learning experience.  Others hope to transition to a new career.

Many College Unbound @ RWU students transfer credits from previous college work or apply for prior learning credits that recognize work or life experience relevant to their learning goals.

A day in the life — reduced to two minutes! – for one of College Unbound @ Roger Williams University’s adult learners.

Video 2:

In June 2011, College Unbound student Talia Lundy worked with a mentor to practice video storytelling, editing, and production.  Her video interviewees recounted their personal experiences learning through the College Unbound @ RWU program.  Check out this video to see Talia’s learning in action – and find out more about our program.

Attend our Jan 11th information session!

Download program information.

Are you one of the 122,000 people across Rhode Island who have attended college but who have not yet earned a diploma?

If so, consider College Unbound @ Roger Williams University! 

Now in its third year in Rhode Island, College Unbound @ Roger Williams University offers a project- and work-based bachelor’s degree .

Our students can earn a bachelor’s of general studies from Roger Williams University’s School of Continuing Studies.  

This program is designed for working adults who want to lead their own learning.  Students can complete a bachelor’s degree that is fully in sync with their career and their personal dreams.

With songs, poems, dance, and spoken-word, these students-as-community-arts-practitioners premiered their first-semester experience during Ashé Cultural Arts Center’s 12th annual Holiday on the Boulevard.

The Ashé Unbound  piece had three parts:  1) students using poems, short stories, and other media to highlight their personal struggles with higher education in the past; 2) a dance and musical invocation of Congo Square and various cultural practices in New Orleans; and 3) students stepping forward with personal reflections of what it means to be unbound in higher education.

Ashé Unbound is a partnership between College Unbound, Roger Williams University, and Ashé Cultural Arts Center. Current students range in age between 23 and 66, and all are affiliated with Ashé Cultural Arts Center, which becomes the focus of their College Unbound learning.

The students will perform this piece again during American Association of Colleges and Universities’ “General Education and Assessment” meeting in New Orleans, February 23-25.

In this part of our new College Unbound website, we look forward to sharing with you some of the reflections that come out of our growing community of learners, leaders, and volunteers.

Our first reflection is an especially timely one, then:

Launching this website wasn’t easy, even though we kept our aspirations small and our design simple.  That’s because, in true College Unbound fashion, we challenged ourselves by building the site through a learning process that pulled in many different students and staff with had a wide range of experience and skills.

Therefore, just the fact that this text is up on a totally-new website means that it’s clearly time to say “Thanks!” to a number of different people:

To our on-site experts/teachers–Brian Mills and Rodney Davis–thank you for your coaching, patient explanations, and for finally building the site and getting us live.

To the College Unbound students who helped us focus on needs, content and, design–Jennifer Green, Mike McCarthy, and now Dennis Driscoll—thank you for your expertise, creativity and ideas.

To Professor Charlie Rosner and his marketing communications students in New York City—thank you for guiding our thinking, questioning, and re-branding.

To those back in Providence who focused on images and storytelling—thank you to Chandelle Wilson, Tara Hagopian, Talia Lundy, and Erin Sheehan for your photography and video work.

And to other program leaders and staff who chipped in on various parts of the brainstorming, drafting, and review process—thank you to Dennis Littky, Jamie Scurry, MR Brezler, Beth Sheehan, Adam Bush, Frank Romanelli, and Anna Haas.

Back to the work, and to building off it our new reflections for you in the months to come.

–The College Unbound Community

By starting with each individual student’s interests, career goals, and visions for the future, our faculty members and coaches make sure that busy adult learners are challenged to grow while also making the most of every single moment and every learning opportunity.

Our 25 new College Unbound @ RWU students in Rhode Island began setting out their individualized learning plans and launching projects of their choice in September 2011.  In New Orleans, Louisiana, 11 staff and community members of the Ashé Cultural Arts Center also began a distance learning version of this program, “Ashé Unbound,” where they work on their bachelor’s degrees by expanding on the current jobs they love.

In January 2012, we’ll bring in a whole new group of students to begin working on their own individualized plans and projects, as well as challenging but supportive methods to achieve all their RWU Bachelor of General Studies degree requirements. (Check out our admissions page to become part of this group!)  These “cohorts” of students will have one another for support – but achieve their goals through fully individualized programs.

Despite their many different interests and contexts, each of our College Unbound @ Roger Williams University students focus their learning around projects they do at an internship or job – learning in the real world.  This can happen at a full- or part-time job the student already has … Or, we might help the student find an internship in a field he or she hopes to pursue.  What’s so different is that it’s no longer about balancing work and school – it’s about fully integrating them!

College Unbound @ SNHU is a three-year, year-round program with a living/learning community for students on SNHU’s Manchester, NH campus.  True to the College Unbound design, each individualized program starts with the student’s interests, not with a prescribed set of courses.  Students spend their time in project-based, real-world learning with less time in the traditional classroom and more time in dynamic work-based internship environments.

College Unbound @ SNHU students, many of whom begin the program directly or soon after high school, will earn a Bachelor of Arts in integrated studies.  They’ve chosen College Unbound with the knowledge that they will graduate ready to lead and with experience, skills, and knowledge that will set them apart from other new graduates in their fields. (Check out our admissions page to connect with program staff and find out more!)

These eight brave pioneers moved into the College Unbound learning community house in South Providence’s Public Street, met their faculty-in-residence, and took off on a learning journey that is unbelievably close to completion – and thus unbelievably close to their next steps as experienced, well-trained thinkers, doers, and leaders in their fields.

With another six students joining them in Fall 2010, these College Unbound students’ interests, dreams, and ideas kept developing and changing along the way, as all curious learners’ do.  Every six weeks, they did public demonstrations of the new “learning competencies” they had developed.  Sometimes these exhibitions were presentations, ranging from leading discussions to showing Pecha Kucha-style slides to pulling in contributors from across the world through an online “Etherpad.” Sometimes they were asked to shake things up even more, with intense group or individual simulations of problem-solving, collaborating, or meeting real-life challenges.

Since 2009, we’ve watched the tight-knit group we know call “Cohorts 1 and 2” build sustainable treehouses, teach local students to work through their feelings in spoken-word poetry, launch a web-video consulting group, plan and lead conferences, coach young entrepreneurs, try out blogs, fundraise for travel, and even explore learning projects in India and Ghana and Brazil and China and places all across the United States.

We’re so proud of the students who helped us make College Unbound all it currently is. We can’t wait to salute all they’ve learned, now and every day leading up to their May 2012 and May 2013 graduation days.