This study focuses upon programs designed for full-time paraprofessional employees in human service agencies given time off with pay to attend school. The programs discussed are those whose curricula are designed to connect with and supplement the participants' work and which also grant degrees. Questionnaire returns from 162 such programs comprised the data. Findings reveal that: (1) paraprofessionals perform with considerable academic success; (2) colleges are making many changes to accommodate the new students; (3) most of the programs are in the field of education and of recent origin; and (4) while programs for paraprofessionals exist at colleges all over the country, there is a clustering of such programs on the two coasts. The programs are viewed as part of the more general trend of opening up the nation's colleges in terms of students who are admitted, courses of study offered, and connection with the non-academic and non-college campus world. (TL)