Clark College (Washington)

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Chime Tower at Clark College, with the Cannell Library behind.

Clark College is a community college located in Vancouver, Washington. It is currently headed by President Bob Knight, former commander of the Vancouver Barracks and graduate of West Point.^[1]

Originally founded as a private, two-year, junior college in 1932, Clark College was at 100 W 13th Street (currently the Hidden House restaurant) from 1933-1937, moving several times within the city. The current campus was formerly part of the Vancouver Barracks, which extended from Fourth Plain to the Columbia River but were ceded by the U.S. Army to the city to become Central Park. In 1951 the Applied Arts Center became its first building at the current location, when the college first offered evening classes. After the Kaiser Shipyards boom of World War II, Clark College rapidly grew to meet the educational needs of the expanded population, the 1944 Serviceman's Readjustment Act and the baby boom.

The college first received state support in 1941, being supervised by the State Board of Education in 1946 with the Vancouver School Board serving as its policy-making body until it was reorganized as a public institution in 1958 and incorporated into the statewide community college system in 1967.

Sun dial near the science buildings.

The college currently sits on an 80 acre (0.3 km²) campus, southwest of Water Works Park and north of Hudson's Bay High School, its sixth location to date. The college's signature carillon Chime Tower was designed by Richard Stensrude, begun in 1964, and incorporates materials from the local Hidden Brick Company and the nearby Alcoa plant. The campus has generally expanded from the southeast northward and other structures include an equatorial bow-style sun dial near the science buildings.

In addition to providing a variety of associate degrees, general adult education and preparation for four-year university degrees, Clark College has historically had well-regarded programs in nursing, dental hygiene and industrial arts such as welding and auto maintenance.

Clark College's mascot is a penguin named Oswald. Clark's Board of Trustees is led by Kim Peery. Preliminary enrollment for fall quarter, 2007, was 11,422 students (full and part-time), with a full-time equivalent of 6,331, including 72 international students and 1,002 "Running Start" students from twenty-nine local high schools.^[2]

Recently Clark College added another building on the campus of the Washington State University Vancouver. There are several classes offered through that building which provide great degree of convenience to the students taking classes at Clark College and Washington State University Vancouver.