History of Southern
Southern West Virginia Community College was established as an independently accredited, comprehensive community college on July 1, 1971 through the consolidation of two existing branches of Marshall University. These branches, located in Mingo and Logan Counties, had been in operation under Marshall’s direction since 1963 and provided the first two years of liberal arts and teacher education along with career programs in secretarial science and radiologic technology. In 1971 these two locations became the first two campuses of Southern as an independently accredited institution of higher education. It was also in 1971 that Southern’s first building as an independent institution was completed in Williamson.
Since 1971 the College has continued to expand its academic, workforce development and community service offerings. In 1976 the West Virginia Board of Regents established formal service areas for each the state's public colleges and universities. Southern was assigned an area of approximately 1,900 square miles that included the counties of Boone, Logan, Mingo and Wyoming. In 1981 the College’s service area was expanded through an interstate agreement with Kentucky which provided for students from Martin and Pike counties to attend Southern and pay in-state tuition and fees. In 1995, with a renewed emphasis on workforce development and technical training, the state legislature changed the College’s name to Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College. In addition to the name change, Senate Bill 547 also outlined eleven community and technical college districts throughout the state which added three additional West Virginia counties, Lincoln, McDowell and Raleigh, to Southern’s district. McDowell and Raleigh were identified as "shared counties" with responsibility for providing educational opportunities shared with two other community colleges.
Along with increasing enrollment, expansion of the geographic area served, and growth in the number and types of programs offered, the College’s physical facilities have also grown through the years. Beginning with the original building on the Williamson Campus in 1971, new facilities have been constructed throughout the College’s district. The construction of the first Logan Campus building was completed in 1979 and a new addition was added in 1987. A new location was selected near Twin Falls State Park and a building was constructed for the Wyoming Campus in 1989. In 1996, the Boone Campus relocated from a renovated facility to a new building adjacent to the Boone County Career and Technical Center. The following year, work began on the "Earl Ray Tomblin Workforce Development and Administrative Complex" in Logan. This facility was completed and occupied in October 1998 and, in 1999, a new library wing was added to the Williamson Campus. In the fall of 2007, a first of its kind classroom facility which is physically connected to the Lincoln County Comprehensive High School was opened. Most recently, in January 2008, the College welcomed students into a new 55,000 square foot, state-of-the-art Allied Health and Technology Center on the Logan Campus. Planning is currently underway to add a technology facility to the campus in Williamson and to secure the soon to be vacated National Guard Armory building. Each of these facilities currently serves as a model for the delivery of comprehensive community college education and provides state-of-the-art facilities needed to train the current and future workforce of the district it serves.
Through the years, Southern has developed educational agreements with several public and private colleges and universities to provide local access to additional opportunities for those who have completed the associate degree. This local access to upper-division courses, baccalaureate and master’s degree programs utilizes a variety of delivery modes including on-campus, face-to-face instruction as well as electronic distance learning and on-line instruction. These agreements with higher education institutions throughout the state and across the nation are continuously updated and new ones initiated as needed.
Higher education governance in West Virginia has undergone many changes over the years. In 1989 two governing boards were established to replace the Board of Regents. Southern was assigned to the Board of Directors of the State College System which had responsibility for governing the four-year colleges and two freestanding community colleges in the state. During the 2000 legislative session, a bill was passed dissolving the two-board system and creating the Higher Education Policy Commission for policy development and other statewide issues. This system was altered again in 2001 by adding a Council for Community and Technical College Education and, today, Southern has its own local Board of Governors and is a member of the West Virginia Community and Technical College System.
In 2006, in cooperation with the Southern West Virginia Community College Foundation, the College launched its first Major Gifts Campaign–Vision 2020–with the purpose of achieving a number of long-range goals for the future success of the institution. To date, this campaign continues and has enjoyed great success in raising community support.
In 2007, Southern joined seven other colleges and universities as a partner in the Erma Byrd Higher Education Center in Raleigh County. And, in December of 2007, the first five students were inducted into the College's first Appalachian Leadership Academy. Southern is partnering with Cotiga Development, Company, Incorporated to provide scholarships and mentoring opportunities for future leaders.
Throughout the years, Southern has continued to provide the highest quality programs and services to its students and is committed to meeting the educational and training needs of the residents of its service district.