[citation needed] Batchelor Institute began in the mid-1960s as an annex of Kormilda College, a residential school for Aboriginal students on the outskirts of Darwin, Northern Territory.

Short training programs were provided for Aboriginal teacher aides and assistants in community schools.

A community-based teacher education program established at Yirrkala in 1976, was later extended to become the Remote Area Teacher Education (RATE) program, and in 1986 Batchelor College entered into a partnership with Deakin University (Melbourne) to deliver a teaching qualification known as Deakin Batchelor Aboriginal Teacher Education Program (DBATE).

[2] A second campus of the college was established in Alice Springs in 1990 to address the educational needs of Aboriginal people from Central Australia.

This meant that BIITE could issue its own degrees and other tertiary qualifications without outside involvement, in the same way as universities, and also be funded like them.