Strengthening Community Partnerships

Branch Campuses

TCC’s earliest off-campus venture was a unique program at the McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary in 1966. A partnership with Peninsula School District led to the Adult Evening School’s opening in 1971. In 1974, TCC helped support the district’s education program at the new Purdy Women’s Treatment Center.

TCC embarked on a major expansion of satellite campuses in the late 1970s to increase accessible and specialized offerings to a broader range of learners. By 1978, the college had programs at McNeil, Purdy, McChord Air Force Base, Fort Lewis, the County-City Building in Tacoma, and the Eastside Boy’s Club. From 1980 to 1981, TCC opened the Southeast College Center, Downtown Center and the Peninsula College Center extension campuses. The latter would become the Gig Harbor campus when it opened in its new facility in 1995.

While many of these campuses were consolidated over the years, Gig Harbor has persisted as an essential campus of TCC.

Health Careers

The most notable of TCC’s early occupational programs was its partnership with St. Joseph’s Hospital and Tacoma General Hospital to provide associate’s degrees in health care. Coordinating with the hospitals’ schools of nursing, x-ray technology, and medical records technology, TCC offered three programs beginning in 1968. Health programs moved onto campus in 1972, but St. Joseph’s and other area hospitals including Lakewood, Good Samaritan, Madigan Army Hospital, the Veteran's Hospital at American Lake continued to open their doors to TCC nursing students for clinical training opportunities. 

As TCC built its on-campus capacity for health careers training, the college added numerous new specializations throughout the 1970s. The fully-accredited programs were designed to prepare students for necessary certifications and exams upon graduation. Many programs included internship placements for direct work experience at locations such as juvenile detention center Remann Hall.

Although this exponential growth began to slow in the 1980s, new opportunities and partnerships continue to be developed for health professionals at TCC. Now, TCC provides one of the most high-demand access points to health careers in the community.

Partnering with Indigenous Students and Communities

TCC’s support for indigenous community members has been most successful through the intentional building of partnerships and student-led initiatives. Indigenous students organized as early as 1973, with the most active group being the Student Koalition of Indian Natives (SKIN), formed in 1977.

In 1989, a Native American Club was revitalized, and with the support of the new Multi-Cultural Student Support Program, the club remained active through the 1990s. The group became the Native American Student Union (NASU) in the early 2000s. With NASU, TCC began co-sponsoring and hosting the TCC-Tacoma Public Schools (TPS) Pow Wow in 2006. The free event celebrates indigenous culture and marks the graduation of Native TPS students.

The Sister City Program

Tacoma’s oldest sister city relationship is with Kitakyushu, Japan, and has existed since 1959.

TCC received its first group of Japanese exchange students in the summer of 1974. Partnerships in the 1980s brought students and performers from Japan’s Tamagawa University and musicians from sister city countries Japan, South Korea, and Israel.

TCC began hosting University of Kitakyushu (UKK) students in 2004, and the first six-month cohort arrived in Fall 2008. Five years later, TCC and UKK signed a memorandum of understanding to allow TCC students to travel and study in Japan.