The Benton Place Campus will be the home campus for some college graduates beginning next year. That is when students enrolled at the Catoosa County satellite site for Bryan College’s Aspire Program will receive their baccalaureate degrees.
Aspire, started in 1993, is a degree completion program designed for students 23 and older who attended college for several years without gaining an undergraduate degree, according to Janet Brock, the program’s admissions coordinator.
The typical student is a middle-class working adult in their mid-30s and many have families or are single moms, she said.
“There was a growing need for adults to continue completion of a four-year degree while juggling family,” Brock said. “This fills a need because there are plenty of adults who need and want to complete a degree with a program that fits their schedule.”
Michael Lea, 40, and an account executive with a local company, was one of the first to enroll at Aspire’s Catoosa County site last October.