The Central Catholic Teachers’ College, or CCTC, was opened for students in Albert Park on 1st May 1906 with the official opening on 5th August.  It was an extension of the work done by Mother Gonzaga Barry and Loreto at the Teachers’ Training College begun in 1884 in Dawson Street, Ballarat.

The passing of the 1905 Teachers’ and Schools’ Registration Act made more extensive and widely available teacher training necessary and Archbishop Carr encouraged the establishment of a Central Training College. M. Gonzaga was in an ideal position to provide the latest training as she had kept in touch with overseas movements and had the resources of M. Hilda Benson, graduate of the Notre Dame Training College, Liverpool, and Miss Barbara Bell, a graduate of the Secondary Teachers’ Training College, Cambridge.  Both these women were experts in this field.  The College was a pioneer in primary and secondary teacher training in Australia and retained the services of highly qualified secular lecturers who provided regular and occasional lectures.  The College also held Saturday morning demonstration lessons open to students and practicing teachers.  The Training College was inclusive in its enrolments and was responsible for the training of very fine teachers who were influential in the development of education in independent schools particularly.

The College was designed to fulfil two purposes, to educate both religious and secular teachers and to provide a hostel for university students.  It offered Registration (a one year course for primary registration) and Diploma of Education (Secondary) and, early on, Matriculation, Senior, Junior and Sub-Junior Public courses to prepare students for teaching courses.  In 1918 St. Mary’s Hall took over the resident university students and the Diploma of Education students.

During the War years M. Elizabeth Forbes, M. Patrick Callanan and M. Catherine Goddard were a formidable leadership team.

With on-going financial difficulties, the move for religious orders to train their own teachers and St. Mary’s College partially taking over some functions, the CCTC closed in 1924 relocating briefly in Dawson Street Ballarat in 1925.