TMCC History
Turtle Mountain Community College (TMCC) is one of the original six tribal colleges that were established by various Indian Tribes in the early 1970’s. The Turtle Mountain Chippewa Tribe chartered the college in 1972. The TMCC is located in north central North Dakota in the historical wooded, hilly, and lake-filled area known as the Turtle Mountains. In addition to being the home of the Turtle Mountain Chippewa, the area is the home of the world-renowned International Peace Garden.
In its brief history, the College has emerged as a leader among this nation’s 36 tribal colleges. Its origin was humble. For the first few years, the College operated out of two offices on the third floor of a former Catholic Convent. For a short period, the College operated out of the basement of an abandoned Indian Health Service facility. In 1977, the College moved into an abandoned tribal building and a BIA facility that had been moved to Belcourt’s main street by a tribal member who had converted the building to a café and dance hall. It was on Belcourt’ s main street that the College later purchased and renovated several old buildings and as funding became available built a series of primarily metal buildings.
In 1994, Congress granted Tribal Colleges Land Grant status. Land grant status helps TMCC become more connected to the mainstream institution by sharing projects, resources, and information with other land grant colleges. The land grant status gives TMCC access to equity grants, research grants, extension grants, and interest from an endowment fund. Most of these programs are competitive based but the endowment interest funding is paid annually based on the student count formula per college. The campus houses the USDA Land Grant programs.
In May 1999, the College moved to a new campus and a new facility. The new facility is located 2 ½ miles north of Belcourt. TMCC’s new main campus includes a 124,000-square/ft. building located on an approximately 123-acre site. The new facility includes state of the art, technology, a fiscal area, general classrooms, science, math and engineering classrooms, labs, library and archives, learning resource center, faculty and student services area, gymnasium and mechanical systems, an auditorium with seating capacity for 1000, Career and Technical Education building, and a new Student Center. The former main campus in Belcourt has twelve buildings that provide 66,000 square feet of space. Both campuses are being used for college or community use.
The two campuses house all college functions with the exception of some off-campus community responsive training programs. TMCC is a commuter campus and maintains no residence halls. The main campus site has a 60 meter 660 kW wind turbine that helps supply general use electricity to the main building. Coupled with geothermal heating and cooling system, the turbine helps make TMCC’s main campus building ecofriendly.
The former Interpretive Center was remodeled and expanded in 2010 to house the Allied Health Programs. The new Allied Health Building, located west of the main campus building, is 7,090 square feet. The facility houses faculty offices, separate labs for each of the following programs: Nursing, Phlebotomy/Medical Lab Tech Programs and one common lecture classroom.
In 2002, Anishinaabe campus was purchased and consists of 102.5 acres of land along the shores of Belcourt Lake. It is located between the north main campus and the south campus. Anishinaabe Cultural and Wellness Center is the home of the 1994 Land Grant programs. The center hosts many culturally appropriate health, educational, social, leadership, research, and community service programs. There is a 2.5-mile-long hiking trail and confidence course that weaves throughout the wooded acreage. Anishinaabe also has a Straw Bale building equipped with solar panels built in 2004. In 2012, a demonstration kitchen classroom was added to the main building at the Anishinaabe campus, which also includes a root cellar below the kitchen. TMCC renovated the Trading Post building on this campus to provide space for entrepreneurial incubation activities. A new small biomass greenhouse is projected to be completed in 2013 to support land grant activities.
Since its beginning, the college has grown from a fledgling institution serving less than sixty students per year, to its current status of serving over 650 full time equivalents and approximately 250 pre-college adults. Indeed, TMCC has demonstrated success in enrolling and graduating students. The College serves the tribal community in other ways too. Its many programs are helping to build local capacity to effect positive systemic change by improving all levels of educational achievement of tribal members and public and private economic sustainability of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians.