AREA COLLEGES MATCH PACE OF VALLEY SOCIETY.

Byline: Steve Carney Staff Writer

In the 1940s and '50s, the San Fernando Valley saw its greatest population growth ever, and with that flood came the thirst for higher education and its attendant cultural and academic benefits.

Pierce College, Los Angeles Valley College and California State University, Northridge, all were founded during this era. Valley residents seeking a college education no longer had to go over the hill.

Pierce College opened for business in a Woodland Hills barley field in September 1947. It was the brainchild of physician and city Board of Education member Clarence W. Pierce, who believed the Valley needed an agricultural school.

Since the days when cows poked their heads into classroom windows, Pierce College has evolved into a community college offering programs in liberal arts, business and science, and agriculture.

Women were first admitted in 1951, and they now make up more than half of the school's enrollment of 15,000. Also, about half of the students are Latino or Asian-American, and Pierce school officials say its lower tuition gives students a chance to begin a college career they might not otherwise afford at public or private four-year colleges.

Los Angeles Valley College in Van Nuys, another two-year school, was founded two years after Pierce and this year celebrates its 50th anniversary.

The college started with 439 students on the campus of Van Nuys High School and moved to its permanent, 105-acre site on Fulton Avenue in 1951.

``We serve such a diverse audience,'' said community relations dean Dennis Reed. ``Many times the students who come here are the first in their families to go to college.''

Many of the school's 17,000 students are older than the typical freshman or sophomore and are there either to learn new job skills or to dabble in new areas of interest.

``They lose a job or get a divorce and find themselves suddenly having to re-enter the work force,'' Reed said, or ``they come in and take that art class or the music class they wanted when they were younger but didn't have the time.''

The school features a planetarium, theater, art gallery, the Valley College Historical Museum and sports teams for football, baseball, basketball and swimming.

CSUN started in 1955 in classrooms leased at San Fernando High School. A year later, it opened its campus on 165 acres in Northridge, where 40 instructors taught 1,475 students. Now it boasts 27,000 students, 1,400 faculty and a 353-acre campus.

The school sometimes is sneered at for being a commuter university, but that has been CSUN's nature since it began as the Valley campus of Los Angeles State College. Housewives and veterans paying their tuition through the GI Bill commuted throughout the Valley to get college educations.

The campus is one of the most racially diverse in the state, but it wasn't always that way. The first students were almost exclusively white, while now only about 40 percent are. In 1968 black students protesting racism took the school administrators hostage and demanded the creation of African and Latino studies departments. Three students were sentenced to prison for the takeover, but the departments were founded the following year.

CSUN officials say the school's greatest crisis came with the Northridge Earthquake in January 1994. The temblor devastated the campus and caused $321 million in damage. Though enrollment dropped 10 percent, the university was able to open for the 1994 spring semester. And officials say CSUN's rebound is evinced by the university's continuing construction and rising enrollment.

Originally called San Fernando Valley State College - the name change came in 1972 - CSUN is the third-largest university in Los Angeles. It offers bachelor's degrees in 51 fields and master's degrees in 42 subject areas. The school's music department and speech pathology program have been ranked among the nation's best.

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