The History of Orion
Orion Institute (Perrysburg, OH)
Healing Arts Institute (HAI), [now Orion Institute] has a long history offering massage therapy and other alternative health classes to the Community and employers in northern Ohio. HAI was founded in fall of 1997 by Jodi Romaker, offering Massage Therapy instruction, continuing education classes, massage therapy services, and related products in its Body Therapy store.
The school has since expanded to provide additional space for classrooms, offices, and student resources. In the summer of 2014, School Management determined through research and discussions with various community members and local employers that there was a need to increase its programmatic offerings in both related and non-related areas, such as Allied Health and Skilled Trades programs.
The school’s mission was changed and internal research led school management to also consider a new school name that could represent this growing, multi-faceted institution.
In late 2015, Healing Arts Institute changed its name to Orion Institute. School Management, Community partners and local employers again met and reached consensus on this new name. Everyone felt that Orion Institute better represented the growing institution’s image and vision for expanded programmatic offerings.
In early 2016, an Advanced Massage Therapy program and a Medical Assisting program were approved and introduced to meet employer demand.
Orion Technical College (Davenport, IA)
Orion Technical College has been proud to provide the Quad City area quality technical training since 1969. From our humble beginning as the Academy of Radio and Television (ART) in Bettendorf, IA and then changing to becoming Hamilton Technical College and as of July of 2020 expects to be operating as Orion Technical College, continuing to evolve to meet the needs of the employment community as we continue to train students in technical and allied health fields.
Our founder, Charles Hamilton, Jr., began the college by preparing students to take the Federal Communications Commission examination for broadcasting. While teaching students around his kitchen table he envisioned going beyond test preparation to training students to be broadcasters. Soon his vision expanded with the needs of the employers in the community and an Electronics program developed in 1978. In 1980, as the program grew, the name was changed to Hamilton Technical College. In the 1990’s Hamilton Technical College responded to a need in our medical community by creating a Medical Assisting Technology Program and in 2006 the Medical Billing and Coding program was started. In an effort to define our two distinct program areas, Hamilton Technical College created the School of Technology (including Electronics Engineering Technology AS and BS degree programs) and the School of Allied Health (including Medical Assisting Technology and Medical / Insurance Coding Specialist Programs).