12 of the Quirkiest Colleges and Learning Institutes

From a college focused on cannabis studies to a dedicated gelato university, there are many surprising and fascinating institutions of higher education in the world.

This list—adapted from the above episode of The List Show on YouTube—is devoted to colleges and universities that offer something other than your typical bachelor’s degree in engineering or boring medical degrees. Nope, from here on out it’s death, tattoos, and a fair amount of nudity as we look at some of the quirkiest institutions of higher learning around.

Gupton-Jones College
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Deep Springs College
Reed College
Bard College at Simon’s Rock
Naropa University
Oaksterdam University
Hampshire College
Master Tattoo Institute
Carpigiani Gelato University
Webb Institute
St. John’s College

Gupton-Jones College

For a lot of students, college is about getting out in the world and experiencing everything life has to offer. But at Gupton-Jones College in Decatu, Georgia, the focus is on death. The school is one of the few in the country to offer a curriculum that prepares graduates for a career in the funeral service industry. You’ll be taking classes ranging from embalming to microbiology to restorative art, a trade term for making the dearly departed look their best.

The Gupton-Jones College of Funeral Services was founded in 1920 as the Gupton-Jones School of Embalming in Nashville before merging with the Dallas Institute of Mortuary Science in 1954 and eventually moving to Georgia in 1969. It’s not all laughs at the school, which requires students to dress in a way that shows respect for the serious topics being discussed. Collared shirts, slacks, and blouses are mandated. Graduates earn an Associate of Applied Science in Funeral Service degree to prepare them for a life in death. But it’s far from the only school that takes a unique approach to studies.

University of Alaska Fairbanks

Take a school with another frigid reputation—the University of Alaska Fairbanks, which is located in the state’s second largest city and boasts of a campus where temperatures can plummet as low as minus -40° F. The school even keeps a digital temperature sign outdoors to satisfy those who want to boast of braving dangerous weather in pursuit of higher education. You can expect plenty of environmental lessons, with majors available in everything from aerospace to petroleum engineering. And if you’re into outdoor recreation, UAF is probably the only college in the country with an ice tower for climbing.

Another tidbit about UAF. The school opened in 1922 and actually predates Alaska’s statehood. They didn’t join the rest of the U.S. as the 49th state until 1959.

Deep Springs College

Do you yearn for higher education yet feel destined for a life among nature? Would you like to have structure yet walk among cow manure? Deep Springs College is probably for you. Located in California’s Deep Springs Valley about 14 miles from the Nevada border, the fully-accredited two-year liberal arts schools drops students on a combination cattle ranch and alfalfa farm. In addition to academic responsibilities, they’re expected to work a minimum of 20 hours per week to help foster a sense of community. Making small talk between classes in a sprawling campus? Forget it. Students milk cows, make farm repairs, and set gopher traps.

The other pillar of Deep Springs is in self-governance. Unlike most universities, Deep Springs permits students to participate in the day-to-day administration of the campus and running committees, including overseeing admissions.

As you can probably guess, Deep Springs is not looking to emulate a conventional college experience. There are no big football games because there’s no football team, and there’s also a no-drinking policy. It’s one of two ground rules instituted and maintained by students, who also prohibit leaving the campus during the school year unless it’s on official school business—like a field trip—or because of an emergency.

If being trapped on a work farm with no booze sounds appealing, be forewarned that Deep Springs is highly exclusive. Only 24 to 32 students are enrolled at any given time, with just 14 selected from a pool of 300 applicants annually. The good news? If you make it, you’ve also earned a full scholarship. And you’ll get to milk something.

Reed College

Nudity is part of the college experience, though it’s not often the university itself endorses it. One exception is Reed College, a liberal—very liberal—school in Portland, Oregon, that made a name for itself as a clothing-optional campus.

The apparel-averse student body has roots in the 1960s, when two headline-worthy events took place. In 1967, a group of students decided to go skinny-dipping in the indoor swimming pool and caused a minor furor. After some faculty complaints, special skinny-dipping hours were allotted. The following year, in 1968, students protesting what they felt was an aggressive anti-shoplifting policy in the campus bookstore arrived naked to demonstrate they couldn’t be smuggling any books out in a bookbag or—well, anywhere.

This body positivity has not always been met with acclaim. In 2013, an unnamed member of the community voiced concern that the tradition of a group of naked students welcoming freshmen was offensive and alienating to some of the students. The controversy had a marked impact on campus nudity, though some students still ascend a climbing attraction known as the Naked Tree sans clothing.

One more fact about Reed that would have caused it to make this list even without the nakedness: the campus has a working nuclear reactor. Used as a learning tool for nuclear power, the reactor sits at the bottom of a 25-foot deep tank and has been in operation continuously since 1968. Students who oversee it must be licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. It’s believed that the reactor isn’t powerful enough to either suffer a meltdown or cause a chain reaction. Nudity and nuclear power. It’s everything you want in a school.

Bard College at Simon’s Rock

Think you need a high school degree to go on to college? Not necessarily. At Bard College at Simon’s Rock in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, students can enroll as young as 16 and before they’ve started 11th or 12th grade. They can pursue a variety of majors in fields like biology, music, or psychology—all without needing a high school diploma.

Bard is a proponent of early college, or the idea that there are some high school juniors and seniors who are psychologically and intellectually ready to take the college leap sooner than some of their peers. Simon’s Rock founder, Elizabeth Blodgett Hall, created the all-women college in 1966 on the principle that college starts too late for some. At that time, the college merged the last two years of high school with the first two years of college before becoming a full four-year co-ed university. It merged with Bard College in 1979.

But the college isn’t a gimmick, or a pass to getting out of a humdrum high school existence. It’s produced 10 Fulbright Fellows since 2010 and counts journalist Ronan Farrow and filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen among its alumni.

Naropa University

If you feel a sense of inner peace missing from your college experience, mostly due to hedonistic frat guys having raging keggers two doors down in the dorm, you might want to consider giving Naropa University a shot. This Boulder, Colorado, university puts an emphasis on Buddhist philosophies.

The school is named for Naropa, an 11th-century Buddhist scholar of legend who was involved in Nalanda University, a spiritually-focused learning institution in India. Naropa the school started offering classes in Boulder in 1974. Among the first faculty members was Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, who co-founded the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, a creative writing curriculum. Today, it still promotes mindfulness and meditation along with Western majors, an approach known as contemplative education. While meditation isn’t required, if you enroll in a mindfulness course, you will be expected to spend several hours a week in deep repose while your parents sit in disbelief that they’ve spent more than $36,000 for you to sit around.

However, the school is looking to take a more remote approach. In 2024, Naropa sold its main Boulder campus and its Allen Ginsberg Library in an effort to downsize following the COVID-19 pandemic. While it will maintain physical classes in a smaller location in Boulder, roughly 40 percent of its students are studying and practicing measured breathing at a distance.

Oaksterdam University

Boulder isn’t the only place to get high. At Oaksterdam University in Oakland, California, students can pursue a career in cannabis. The school—America’s first cannabis college—offers certification courses in horticulture, business, manufacturing, and budtending, which is the practice of working a dispensary counter. While you can’t get your masters in weed, you can earn credits toward a Bachelor’s Degree in Cannabis Business.

Being on the cutting edge of a controversial new industry isn’t without risk. In 2012, Oaksterdam’s campus was raided by federal agents, and its assets, including marijuana, were seized. Though the motive for the raid was murky, it’s likely Oaksterdam found itself caught between more permissive state marijuana laws and more restrictive federal prohibitions. Founder Richard Lee was forced into retiring from the school to avoid having any potential legal issues related to him become problems for the school.

It’s less contentious these days. Other schools, like Roanoke College, offer a BS in Cannabis Science, and graduation ceremonies are unlikely to be raided by the feds.

Hampshire College

Sometimes it feels like grades are passe in our modern world. Why be at the mercy of subjective evaluations by stuffy professors? If you don’t want to be indebted to letter grades, consider Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts, which does away with conventional A to F grades. Instead, attendees receive narrative evaluations from teachers about their progress.

Hampshire isn’t the only university to experiment with this alternative system. It’s called “ungrading,” and it’s practiced in a number of places, sometimes just for incoming freshmen. It’s intended to reduce student stress by eliminating pressure to perform and on the premise that a lower grade doesn’t necessarily mean a student learned less. At Brown University in Rhode Island, you might get an A, B, or C, but no D or F.

Sometimes certain instructors will make use of ungrading rather than the school as a whole. At the University of Michigan-Dearborn, Associate Professor Emily Luxon maintains grades but gives students multiple tries to better the quality of their submitted work.

It does sound unusual, but consider—as a student, how many times have you asked a teacher what you need to do to get an A and then performed the bare minimum? That’s what ungrading is trying to avoid.

Master Tattoo Institute

There are plenty of art schools in the world, but not many that specialize in the unique art of tattooing. If you think your career path will wind up in a tat shop, you can consider the Master Tattoo Institute in Miami Beach, Florida. Attendees can take online or in-person courses ranging from the fundamentals of tattooing to advanced body piercing. While that’s not mandatory for body piercers, having some formal instruction before you put a hole in someone does sound like a good idea.

Obviously, tattoo school isn’t a prerequisite. Tattoo artists usually break into the industry by becoming apprentices under experienced artists and then getting licensed, though those requirements can vary by state. Other offbeat art lessons can be had at the University of Connecticut, which offers a BFA in Puppet Arts, and Emerson College, where funny people or not-so-funny people can learn to be amusing and earn a BFA in Comedic Arts.

Carpigiani Gelato University

Do you want to make gelato not just a hobby but a career? A Carpigiani Gelato University in Bologna, Italy, you can get a leg up in your gastronomic education. Gelato is, as you probably know, a less creamy type of artisanal ice cream perfected by Italian chefs. This isn’t a frozen dairy dessert but the real thing. Roughly 2000 people attend Carpigiani each year for its cutting-edge gelato technology and access to its esteemed gelato experts, and many more take online courses.

In 2017, Business Insider reported that attendees experienced eight-hour classroom days and a crash course in gelato production as well as the ins and outs of opening a gelato business. If you’re worried about not speaking Italian, it’s not a problem. Classes are offered in French, English, and Spanish.

Webb Institute

Sure, Harvard is cool. So is Yale. But wouldn’t you want to go to college at stately Wayne Manor? You can. Kind of. Webb Institute is a naval university located in Glen Cove, New York, and its main building is so regal that Warner Bros. has used it repeatedly for exterior shots of Bruce Wayne’s estate in several Batman projects, including Batman Forever, the Fox TV series Gotham, and the first Joker movie with Joaquin Phoenix.

But standing in for Batman’s bachelor pad is not the coolest fact about the school. Offering a dual degree in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering means students need some hands-on experience with naval research. The school has a 90-foot long towing tank used for model ships. And if you’re lucky enough to get into Webb, you’ll at least feel like a privileged rich kid even if you aren’t one. Tuition for all incoming American students is free.

St. John’s College

There’s required reading and then there’s required reading. At St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, students aren’t given a stack of textbooks to review. They’re assigned dozens of examples of classic literature instead. Their undergraduate curriculum hinges on the reading and reviewing of over 200 titles, some of which date back 3000 years. Then, students participate in roundtable discussions of the works.

Freshmen, expect to explore the writings of Archimedes, Aristotle, and Virginia Woolf. Sophomores move on to the Bible, Chaucer, and Shakespeare. Juniors enjoy Austen, and seniors peruse Karl Marx, Emily Dickinson, and Supreme Court decisions. Want to graduate? You better learn to like or at least understand James Joyce.