Evergreen State College
The Evergreen State College is a public liberal arts college in Olympia, Washington. Founded in 1967, it offers a non-traditional undergraduate curriculum in which students have the option to design their own study toward a degree or follow a pre-determined path of study. Full-time students can enrol in interdisciplinary academic programs, in addition to stand-alone classes. Programs typically offer students the opportunity to study several disciplines in a coordinated manner. Faculty write substantive narrative evaluations of students' work in place of issuing simple grades.
Evergreen's main campus, which includes its own salt-water beach, spans 1,000 acres of forest close to the southern end of Puget Sound. Evergreen also has a satellite campus in nearby Tacoma. The school offers a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Bachelor of Science, Master of Environmental Studies, Master in Teaching, Master of Public Administration, and Master of Public Administration in Tribal Governance.[1] As of 2018, there were 3,327 students, 3,018 of whom were undergraduates, and 223 faculty.[2]
Evergreen was one of many alternative colleges and programs launched in the 1960s and 1970s, often described as “experiments.”[3] While the vast majority of these have either closed or adopted more mainstream approaches, Evergreen is one of the few that have remained steadfast in pursuing its original mission.[4][5]