Once on the Ropes, a Small Black College Launches a National Effort

David Pellerin, AP Images

Paul Quinn College appeared to be on its deathbed in 2007. The small, historically black college in Dallas was hemorrhaging students, would soon lose its accreditation, and had seemingly insurmountable debt.

Now, the college plans to expand into cities across the country.

Michael J. Sorrell, president of the college and the person who is largely credited with its turnaround, announced on Tuesday that he plans to build a network of urban work colleges — and that Paul Quinn is going to be the guinea pig. “Our way forward is going to be through doing something different,” he told the audience during his keynote speech at the SXSW EDU 2018 conference in Austin.

Last year, Paul Quinn became the first historically black college to be designated a “work college” by the U.S. Department of Education. Work colleges are institutions where all students have jobs on campus regardless of financial need or academic program. There are fewer than a dozen such federally designated institutions in the country, and the colleges are often touted as sustainable, affordable models of higher education.

The benefits of being a work college, however, do not come without some risk. Having students work in campus jobs, such as accounts payable, as opposed to hiring traditional staff members, can make it difficult to carry out cost-cutting measures such as eliminating positions.

“We became a work college because we had to acknowledge that our students were not ready for career success in the way that we would have liked,” Sorrell told The Chronicle in an interview following his speech. “We’re not the only ones. We’re just one of the few that are honest about it.”

And beyond ensuring that preparation, colleges must also make sure they’re leaving students better off financially.

“We have to be cognizant of the financial condition that we’re leaving students in when they leave college,” Sorrell says. “But we also have to be cognizant of the financial condition that we’re leaving students in when they don’t finish college.”

Paul Quinn leaders have selected the first site for the college network’s initial “presence,” a concept Sorrell described as being not necessarily a traditional campus, but a location where students can live, work, and take their classes. And the college has identified a handful of other locations across the country for its continued expansion. It is unclear where Paul Quinn will obtain the money to get the plan off the ground.

Sorrell’s big idea has two parts: the network, which is the expansion of Paul Quinn College to other cities, and a consortium of other colleges that want to implement the work-college format. If executed well, he says, students will have greater flexibility in taking courses while also receiving an affordable education.

Establishing the network and making it successful will be a difficult task to pull off. Sorrell acknowledges that, but he also sees it as a necessary undertaking.

“Yes, it’s difficult,” he says. “But you know what’s really difficult? Spending your life in poverty because no one made it easier for you to get out.”

“Our goal,” Sorrell says, “is to end poverty.”

Adam Harris is a breaking-news reporter. Follow him on Twitter @AdamHSays or email him at adam.harris@chronicle.com.