functions of the regional colleges. In 1990, the West of Scotland Agricultural College was merged with the East of Scotland College of Agriculture and the North of Scotland College of Agriculture into the Scottish Agricultural College, a single higher education and research institution specialising in agriculture. The institution's three main divisions offered research, education and consultancy. The new specialist institution was one of the largest of its type in Europe and the largest in the UK. The institution offered undergraduate and postgraduate programmes from its three campuses in Ayr, Aberdeen and Edinburgh, as well as training and online study on topics including the environment, business, leisure, agriculture, horticulture and science.
=== Barony College ===
Before it became a college, the 300 acre Barony estate had a varied existence. It was an elegant home, a home for the elderly, a wartime army training camp and, up until 1947, a prisoner of war camp. In 1949 Dumfries County Council education department purchased the estate with the purpose of turning it into an agricultural school. The Barony Farm School opened in 1953, with a class of 46 boys aged 14 to 15 years. Day release classes in agriculture and engineering began in 1962.
In 1972, the school became Barony Agricultural College and, over the 1970s, courses on offer expanded to include NC awards in agriculture, fish farming, forestry, countryside rangers, horticulture, animal care, veterinary nursing and equine studies. By this time, most students at the college were studying full time. A new teaching block, complete with a large sports hall, multigym and bar, was opened in 1992. The new millennium brought extra investment in animal care and veterinary nursing, an equine unit and a forestry technology centre. The dairy technology centre with a robotic milking system was opened in 2006.
=== Oatridge College ===
Oatridge Agricultural College was established as a residential further education college specialising in agriculture and rural skills …
