Darton College is now a four-year unit of the University System of Georgia, located in Albany, Dougherty County, Georgia, U.S. The college has 84 two-year transfer and career associate degrees and 45 certificate programs. The institution was founded as Albany Junior College in 1963 and offered its first classes in 1966. In 1987, a committee of faculty, staff, students and community members chose the name Darton College. "Darton" is an Old English word meaning "town by the water," which refers to Albany's location on the Flint River. The 180 acre (728,000 m²) campus on Albany's western edge includes a 470-seat theater, library, fitness center, computer labs, and sports facilities such as tennis and racquetball courts, indoor swimming pool, indoor bowling alley and climbing wall, with surrounding nature trails, soccer fields, and ball fields. Darton College enrolls more than half of the area's high school graduates and approximately 45% of the students are from Dougherty County. (The population of the MSA was 162,800 in 2004.) Approximately 1% of students are from out-of-state and about 100 are from other countries. About 57% of Darton's students are under age 24.