The Folk School offers classes year-round in over fifty subject areas including art, craft, music, dance, and nature studies.

[5] The Folk School has more than 800 week-long and weekend classes year-round in traditional and contemporary arts, including blacksmithing, music, dance, cooking, gardening, nature studies, photography, storytelling, and writing.

The Folk School engages the community through a variety of dance teams including: Rapper Magic Sword, StiX in the Mud Border Morris, Dame's Rocket Northwest Clog, Rural Felicity Garland, and the JCCFS Cloggers.

[8] After spending eighteen months traveling between Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland, visiting local schools along the way, Olive Dame Campbell and her colleague Marguerite Butler, began forming the John C. Campbell Folk School in 1925 in Brasstown, North Carolina, along the Cherokee County and Clay line.

Recently married to Olive Dame of Massachusetts, John undertook a fact-finding survey of social conditions in the mountains in 1908–1909.

While John interviewed farmers about their agricultural practices, Olive collected Appalachian ballads and studied the handicrafts of the mountain people.

The Campbells talked of establishing such a school in the rural southern United States as an alternative to the higher-education facilities that drew young people away from the family farm.

The campus included men’s and women’s dormitories, a dairy barn, poultry houses, and a saving and loan association.

Due to frequent gatherings at the Folk School, Brasstown clocks were set half-way in-between to avoid confusion.

[23] In early 2022 the Folk School opened Olive's Porch, a studio space and retail shop, in downtown Murphy.

[citation needed] Other types of classes include: Baking; Cooking; Dance; Folklore; Gardening; Music; Nature Studies; Storytelling; and Writing.