Ashland Community and Technical College - History

History

The Ashland Junior College was founded in 1938 to allow students the opportunity to obtain an associates' degree or to complete their first two years of a bachelors' degree. During the same year, the Ashland Vocational School was created by the Ashland Independent School system, providing vocational and technical training.

Authorized by the Kentucky General Assembly and signed by Governor Bert Combs on March 6, 1962, a mandate was placed upon the University of Kentucky to form a community college system. Two years later, the Board of Trustees implements the legislation and established the Community College System, creating centers in Covington, Ashland, Fort Knox, Cumberland, Henderson and Elizabethtown. The Ashland Junior College was renamed the Ashland Community College and became part of the University of Kentucky Community College System. Eight years later, in 1970, Ashland Community College relocated to the College Drive campus.

On July 1, 1997, the Ashland Technical College and the Ashland Community College began preparations to merge under the "Higher Education Act", passed during a special session of the state legislature which also created the Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS). In the following year, in January 1998, the community college network in the commonwealth left the University of Kentucky to move to the new Kentucky Community and Technical College System. Five years later, on July 1, 2003, the Ashland Community & Technical College merged, consolidating functions.

In 2001, ground was broken for a new campus for the Ashland Technical College in the EastPark Industrial Park along the Industrial Parkway, with funding allocated two years prior. The 43,000 sq ft (4,000 m2). campus, referred to as the 'Ashland Community and Technical College Technology Drive Campus, was dedicated on December 19, 2005 at a cost of $10.4 million, although it did not open until August 16, 2004. An additional $18 million in funding was provided in 2005 for phase two, which will include housing for Culinary Arts, recreation areas, a small bookstore and administrative offices, and for phase three, which will include housing for shop areas for diesel, carpentry, auto mechanics and applied process technologies.

On February 21, 2005, ACTC signed into agreement with Marshall University to provide less costly opportunities for students in obtaining bachelor degrees. The program, dubbed the "two-plus-two" agreement, would allow students to take lower level courses at ACTC and the final two years at Marshall in Huntington, West Virginia. Although it was possible to receive a bachelor's degree in management from Marshall's Lewis College of Business, the agreement expanded the program to nine degrees in the business college.

Due to an aging facility, the Kentucky Community and Technical College System is currently requesting $20 million for the renovation of the College Drive campus, as well as an extra $5 million over the next two years when the Kentucky General Assembly meets in early 2008. The campus would receive a new roof, new electrical wiring, new heating and air conditioning units, improved security features, improvements to parking lots, new paint, a refurbished science lab and new equipment.