Gen Z doesn’t want to go to college. This startup school wants to fix that—by ditching clubs, sports, and dining halls

Arguably, the most memorable parts of college have nothing to do with education. Participating in clubs, rooting for your team at athletic events, and making friends over food at the dining hall are likely among the fondest memories for alumni of any four-year institution—certainly outranking the hours spent sitting in lecture halls, at the very least. But those anecdotes don’t hold up against one simple truth: higher education in America is in crisis. Ballooning tuition costs leave students in staggering debt after graduating, with the average federal student loan debt reaching $40,467 per borrower as of 2026. That’s turned prospective students off from higher education, with 152 colleges and universities in the United States having closed or merged in the past decade. Enter the Greenway Institute, a new kind of college that aims to strip away the extraneous aspects of higher education. That means no extracurricular activities, on-campus eateries, or amenities like gyms. Paring down the college experience means paring down the cost for students—and according to Greenway’s team, the trade-off is more than worth it. How Greenway operates Greenway is currently planning to open its f…