junior college

American  

noun

junior colleges plural

1. a collegiate institution offering courses only through the first one or two years of college instruction and granting a certificate of title instead of a degree.

2. a division of a college, university, or university system offering general courses during the first two years of instruction or fulfilling administrative duties applicable to freshmen and sophomores.

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junior college British  

noun

1. an educational establishment providing a two-year course that either terminates with an associate degree or is the equivalent of the freshman and sophomore years of a four-year undergraduate course

2. the junior section of a college or university

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• junior colleges
  plural

Etymology

Origin of junior college

An Americanism dating back to 1895–1900

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

junior college

Georges, the 2024 quarterback, played a year at Livingstone College in North Carolina and will play for SUNY-Erie, a junior college, this fall.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 28, 2026

Alex was headed to a junior college in Arizona before receiving a last-minute offer from Seattle University.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 19, 2026

A Jordanian company had gotten him admitted to a junior college in a tiny town in Oklahoma.

From Slate ● Apr. 19, 2026

All five of the team’s starters began their careers at other universities, from Arizona Western junior college to North Carolina.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 17, 2026

She’d tried junior college, but couldn’t be bothered to do more than cash the financial aid check.

From "The 57 Bus" by Dashka Slater