Kennesaw State University
public university located near Kennesaw, Georgia, United States
Kennesaw State University (KSU) is a public research university in the U.S. state of Georgia with two campuses in the Atlanta metropolitan area, one in the Kennesaw area and the other in Marietta on a combined 581 acres (235 ha) of land. The school was founded in 1963 by the Georgia Board of Regents using local bonds and a federal space-grant during a time of major Georgia economic expansion after World War II. KSU also holds classes at the Cobb Galleria Centre, Dalton State College, and in Paulding County (Dallas). The total enrollment exceeds 51,000 students making KSU the third-largest university by enrollment in Georgia.
KSU is part of the University System of Georgia and is classified among "Research 2: High Research Spending and Doctorate Production". Kennesaw State's athletic teams are an NCAA Division I member of the Conference USA.
History
Establishment in 1963 until 1975
KSU was chartered by the Board of Regents on October 9, 1963, during one of the most dramatic periods of college expansion in Georgia's history. The university was officially founded by the Georgia Board of Regents approved the establishment of a junior college tentatively to be named Cobb County Junior College. In December 1964, Horace Sturgis was designated to serve as the future college's first president. When the school opened in the fall of 1966, it was named Kennesaw Junior College and had an initial enrollment of 1,014 students.
Early years as Kennesaw College, 1976–1995
Thirteen years later, in 1976, the former Kennesaw Junior College became a four-year college and was redesignated Kennesaw College. Betty Siegel became the second president of Kennesaw College in 1981, and the first female university president in the University System of Georgia.
The public source identifies “Kennesaw State University” as public university located near Kennesaw, Georgia, United States. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Kennesaw, State and University.
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Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1532470. VIAF identifies the subject as 142065138. The Library of Congress control number is n96120062. Authority coordinates are 34.038, -84.581. 4 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1963, 1975, 1964 and 1966.
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This entry incorporates text from “Kennesaw State University” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.