The institution was opened in 1967, as Kabwe Teachers Training College. It trained Junior Secondary School Teachers at its inception. Four years later, the President of Zambia at the time, Kenneth Kaunda, renamed the college Nkrumah Teachers College, in honor of Kwame Nkrumah, the founding president of Ghana. The college was designed to offer courses to pre-service students who specialise in any two teaching subjects at Grade 8 – 12 level at diploma level. In an effort to develop human resources in the education sector, the government of Zambia in 2008 upgraded the college to a university to offer degrees in the teaching subjects.
