Pennsylvania State University-Penn State Lehigh Valley

In 1912, Penn State opened its first permanent branch school in the attic of an elementary school in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Designed to provide professional training to employees, the Allentown Branch School offered evening courses in engineering. Over the next few decades additional programs were added, including three-year evening programs in engineering, technology, and business administration, as well as continuation school offered one day a week for workers in silk mills and other local factories. Eventually the evening programs were compressed into a one-year daytime program designed to meet the needs of returning World War II veterans.