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In 1961, State legislation provided the means for the College to become a countywide community junior college, and on July 1, 1965, Chanute Junior College became Neosho County Community Junior College, an institution with its own governing Board of Trustees. Voters in Neosho County passed a bond issue in October 1965, providing for a four-building campus, separate from the high school, to be constructed in the southwestern part of Chanute. The new facilities—two instructional buildings, with one containing an administrative center; a library; and a student center—were ready for use at the start of the 1968 fall semester. Added to the campus was an interdenominational chapel, a gift from the estate of the late Jewel and K.C. Snyder.
Since 1968, several new buildings have been added to the Chanute campus, including two residence halls, one built in 1971 and another in 2000; a vocational building, completed in 1981; a wellness center, completed in 1991; and a multipurpose building, completed in 2001, as well as expansion and remodeling of some existing facilities.
The university parallel transfer program remains an important one, but state legislation in July 1980 allowed the College to reflect the fact that the transfer program was only one aspect of the total operation of the College. The word junior was omitted from the College name.
In 1979, the Kansas State Board of Education, the state-level body that then exercised oversight for community colleges, assigned service areas to the various colleges. In addition to Neosho County, the College was assigned Franklin County and most of Anderson County. In 1991, the College opened a branch campus in Ottawa, the county seat of Franklin County, using a new building through a lease agreement with the City of Ottawa. An expansion of that building occurred in 1995. In 2003, the NCCC Foundation purchased the Ottawa campus. In 2011, that building was sold and a 52,000 square foot campus was constructed at a new location, 900 E Logan. The new campus includes a Teaching and Learning Center, a simulated hospital, labs for surgical technology and occupational therapy assistant, as well as classrooms and computer labs.
In 2018 NCCC purchased the Ross Lane facility in Chanute and in August of 2021 the Technical Center was named the Mitchell Career and Technology Center due to a generous donation of $1.4 million by Mike and CeCe Mitchell. Phase I of the building opened in August of 2021. Phase II of the renovation, budgeted at $3.6 million, will open in fall of 2022. It will house six technical education programs with room for others in future phases.
Today, the College offers classes and other services on the Chanute campus, the Ottawa campus, and outreach sites in all three counties and beyond. Additionally, the College offers courses online and in a variety of modalities such as live teleconference video classes, as well as hybrid classes that combine face-to-face instruction with online capabilities.
The most recent self-study which was completed in 2013 can be viewed here.
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