CURRICULUM

Instead of an education focused only on developing a student’s rational mind, Jubilee College is dedicated to the development of the whole person.

From studying in the classroom, to stewarding the land, to practicing stillness by the Sacramento River, the entirety of one’s community-based life at Jubilee College is itself the body of the curriculum. Rather than a ‘teach-to-the-test’ model, a transformative learning curriculum encourages students to discern how they are evolving through the experience of work, study, and contemplative practice.

DETAILED COURSE OF STUDY

WORK

Jubilee College — and other colleges in the Work Colleges Consortium — believe in the value of work for preparing students to meet the world with agency, confidence, and maturity.

Placing work on equal footing alongside study and contemplation gives students a way to put their insights into practice. Through work, we drop from the world of ideas into the practicalities of service, creativity and relationship.

The College’s central form of work engages the spirit of sacred hospitality through the daily management of an on-campus restaurant and wilderness lodge. Alongside welcoming in and tending to guests, students will have the opportunity to engage in a broad range of work-study practices that include permaculture design and management, food preservation, agroforestry, and applying traditional ecological knowledge toward renewing the region’s salmon habitat with the Winnemem Wintu.

In addition, all students will design a service-work project in an area of personal interest and community need during their second year. Some students may choose to continue working in this field after graduation. These students will be matched with a mentor through our global network of advisors.

STUDY

The academic year begins in August with an orientation to the campus and the Mount Shasta region.

Then, for two weeks, students, faculty and advisors embark on a learning journey that will take them from some of California’s leading regenerative farms to the home base of today’s emerging technologies, to visits with three communities across this continent, each of which are finding new paths forward in right relation with the earth and one another. After returning, students enter a full academic schedule. Each weekday morning begins with class together either on campus or out in the mountains and alongside local rivers. Students will dive into a rotation of month-long courses that engage with foundational subjects such as Sacred Waters, Emerging Technologies, Money & Gift, and Ceremonial Arts. This “block course” structure allows students and faculty to focus on one subject at a time, immersing themselves fully in one overarching subject each month rather than switching between different modes of study throughout the week.

The second academic year broadens in scope to suit each student’s unique interests. While there are a handful of core classes during the second year, priority is given to electives and self-directed study. This includes a Heart Project that acts as a kind of socially engaged thesis, as well as the opportunity for apprenticeships and support in applying to other educational institutions for students who wish to pursue further formal study.

CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICE

Jubilee College is a school for those who nurture a sincere desire to live into the question of their lives.

There are countless ways to understand this question, from the wisdom that resides beyond all texts, to the famous Platonic dictum, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” To this end, Students at Jubilee College are encouraged to engage in other ways of knowing beyond the rational, linear and material, and to prepare ourselves to meet a changing world, grounded in compassion for one another, humility to see anew, and the intuition to create what’s next.

LEARN MORE

The college refrains from an ideological or faith-based affiliation and yet designs its curriculum with the understanding that all humans are spiritual beings. While the vast majority of colleges and universities have become hyper-secular, Jubilee students are supported to develop a relationship with the mystery and engage wholeheartedly in their own spiritual formation. The weekly schedule provides space for personal contemplation, the exploration of different traditions, and for each student to cultivate a “sacred space” to express the fruits of this exploration. In addition, over the two years, each student will have the opportunity to visit at least two of our sister communities where a renewed connection to Earth, spirit, and one another is being cultivated:

The Maskoke eco-village of Ekvn-Yekolev in Alabama
An immersion in Māori leadership in Aotearoa (New Zealand)
The Gandhi Ashram in India
A “Kuni” Earth sanctuary in Japan
A budding Buddhist community north of Mt. Shasta