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The State of North Carolina recognized the need to provide additional post-high school opportunities as early as 1957. The development of industrial education centers was approved by the General Assembly, and by 1962, twenty (20) institutions were approved.

In the fall of 1963, the Onslow County Board of Education and the Superintendent of Public Schools, Mr. J. Paul Tyndall, asked the Onslow County Commissioners to purchase forty (40) acres of property on U.S. Highway 17 for the establishment of an industrial education center. The newly established Onslow Industrial Education Center was a unit of the Lenoir County Technical Institute.

The untiring efforts of Representative Hugh A. Ragsdale, Representative William D. Mills, and Senator Carl Venters secured appropriation from the 1965 General Assembly to establish a separate institution for Onslow County. The North Carolina State Board of Education approved the Onslow Industrial Education Center on July 1, 1965.

The continuous increase in enrollment of the Industrial Education Center gave evidence of the wide and varied needs of the area. Local support was necessary for the growing institute. The people of Onslow County, by referendum in the fall of 1965, voted for a seven-cents-per-hundred-dollars evaluation on property for the center. The Board of Trustees, realizing that a technical institute could more adequately provide vocational and technical education opportunity for the area, requested that the State Board of Education grant technical institute status to the center. Onslow Industrial Education Center became Onslow Technical Institute on May 4, 1967.

A rapidly increasing enrollment and continued educational demands on Onslow Technical Institute encouraged the Board of Trustees to request community college status for the institute. Onslow Technical Institute was granted community college status July 1, 1970, and became Coastal Carolina Community College.

In 1972, with the dedication of the Hugh A. Ragsdale Building, the Board of Trustees started the relocation of the college to a new campus on Western Boulevard. For several years thereafter, the college operated on a split campus until relocation was completed in 1978.

Coastal Carolina Community College is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (1866 Southern Lane, Decatur, Georgia 30033-4097: Telephone number 404-679-4501) to award associate degrees, diplomas, and certificates.

Coastal is an integral member of the local economic development team by providing effective and timely training for our local workforce through our Division of Continuing Education.

As an institution, we have committed ourselves to providing educational quality, making an investment in technology, forming cooperative partnerships and teamwork, and striving for positive growth in the economic development of Jacksonville/Onslow County.

Knowing our community and the people we serve, being accessible to them, understanding their goals, and making the necessary internal adjustments to meet their immediate and long-term needs is what Coastal is all about. We have made it one of our goals to continuously scan our environment for new challenges, make adjustments, and help prepare our community and its residents to prosper in the 21st Century.