Northern Virginia Community College

"NVCC" redirects here. For the disambugation, see NVCC (disambiguation).

Northern Virginia Community College
Established	1964
Type	Public, 2-year, community college
President	Dr. Robert G. Templin, Jr.
Location	Annandale, Virginia, USA
Campus	6 campuses in Northern Virginia
Website	http://www.nvcc.edu

Northern Virginia Community College, often abbreviated NVCC and colloquially as NOVA, comprises several locations in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., and is both the second largest multi-campus community college in the United States and the largest educational institution in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Overview

Established in Alexandria in 1965, NOVA has added a number of locations. Among these are the Annandale Campus; Manassas Campus; Woodbridge Campus; Loudoun Campus in (Sterling); a Medical Education Campus (in Springfield); an extension of the Alexandria Campus in Arlington, called the Arlington Center; and an extension of the Loudoun Campus in Reston, called the Reston Center. In 2003-2004, the college enrolled 63,000 students in credit courses and some 250,000 more in non-credit offerings. The student body is economically and ethnically diverse, and a very large number of enrollees are international students or immigrants.

Entrance to the Alexandria campus.

The school offers a wide variety of courses, and encourages students to enroll in four-year colleges after completing their NOVA education. To do so, it fosters a system of preferred transfers into public colleges and universities located in the Commonwealth, primarily George Mason University in Fairfax, the only public four-year school in Northern Virginia, but also other public four-year schools in Virginia such as the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Old Dominion University in Norfolk, and Longwood University in Farmville. Private Washington-area schools recruit at NOVA also, including American University, Georgetown, Trinity Washington University, and George Washington University, as well as out-of-area and out-of state schools such as Slippery Rock University in Pennsylvania, West Virginia University, and even the University of Missouri at Kansas City.

Scene from the Alexandria campus.

NOVA is served by a library system extending across all six campuses and the Arlington Center. NOVA Libraries contain over 250,000 volumes and subscribe to over 200 databases, many of these purchased through the Virtual Library of Virginia, meaning that NOVA has access to many of the same resources as the other colleges and universities in Virginia.

NOVA is part of the Virginia Community College System. The college's president is Dr. Robert G. Templin, Jr. Second Lady of the United States Jill Biden is an adjunct professor of English at the college.^[1]

The school's fundraising arm, established in 1979, is the NVCC Educational Foundation. The NVCCEF has a Board of Directors, chaired by Robert L. Calhoun, and its Executive Director is John Ruffino. Largely through the foundation's efforts, NOVA has been able to fund an increasing number of scholarships, and in 2001 completed the Rachel M. Schlesinger Concert Hall and Arts Center on the Alexandria Campus.

Northern Virginia Community College was established in 1964 under the name Northern Virginia Technical College. In the fall of 1965, the College opened with 761 students in a single building in Bailey's Crossroads under President Robert L. McKee. To accommodate an ever-growing student body, the college purchased 78 acres (320,000 m²) in Annandale in 1966 to create the first of six permanent campus sites.

See also

• Northern Virginia Community College (Annandale Campus)
• Goodwill Scholarships

References

1. ^ CNN.com: Jill Biden begins teaching at DC-area community college

External links

• Northern Virginia Community College
• NOVA Libraries
• NOVA Fortnightly The college-wide newspaper of NOVA