History
The university was founded in 1889 by the Presbyterian Church as the Pikeville College Institute. It operated on the primary, secondary and post-secondary levels, although its "college" offerings were not accredited and did not lead to a degree.
In 1909 the school was split into the Pikeville College Academy, which was a private school at the primary and secondary level, and Pikeville College, which was accredited as a junior college, offering the first two-years with an anticipation of students then transferring to another Presbyterian college for a degree. In 1955 the school became a degree granting four-year college in its own right, and in 1957 the academy closed.
In 1997, the Pikeville College School of Osteopathic Medicine, now the University of Pikeville Kentucky College of Osteopathic Medicine, was established. This makes the college one of the smallest colleges in the United States to have a medical school.
The purpose of the osteopathic school, while graduates are fully prepared to specialize in any medical field, is to train primary care physicians to fill the shortage of medical care in the rural section of Appalachia in which it is located. Student recruitment is focused almost exclusively on students with a rural Appalachian background. It is one of 29 osteopathic colleges in the country, and one of five in Appalachia.
On July 1, 2011, the school officially changed its name from "Pikeville College" to the "University of Pikeville". In December 2011, state lawmakers began discussing the idea to make the University of Pikeville a state-supported school. If the proposal in the next legislative session is successful it would make the university the first private university to be added to the state's public university system since the University of Louisville in 1970. In the January 2012 legislative session, Kentucky awarded a contract to the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems (NCHEMS) to study the advisability of converting UPike to the state university system. NCHEMS will complete the study in March 2012 in time for the approval of the Kentucky General Assembly which will adjourn its legislative session at midnight April 15, 2012. In March 2012, the plans to make Pikeville University a state-supported school were abandoned due to political challenges.
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