Higher education institutions were established in the final years of the Pahlavi era, centered in Kermanshah Province in the western regions of Iran. Ilam Province—one of the country’s newly established and underdeveloped provinces—witnessed for the first time the establishment of its earliest institution of higher education at the undergraduate level, specializing in animal husbandry and founded under the auspices of the Kermanshah College of Sciences. Given its historical background, geographical and climatic conditions, extensive rangelands, and the predominance of pastoralist culture and livelihoods, the province constituted a suitable setting for modernizing livestock production and dairy processing. Achieving this objective required up-to-date technical and specialized expertise in animal breeding and livestock products. This study, for the first time, examines the establishment of higher education in Ilam Province through the founding of the Ilam Faculty of Animal Husbandry as a branch of Razi University. The findings indicate that the earliest scientific policymaking efforts for higher education in Ilam were initiated through field studies conducted by teams from the higher education sector—initially under the framework of the Kermanshahan College of Sciences, and later as a campus of Razi University, which served as one of the most important centers of higher education in western Iran—in collaboration with the University of Akron in the United States. On this basis, the foundation of the first institution of higher education in Ilam Province was laid, and the Ilam Faculty of Animal Husbandry, as one of Razi University’s satellite faculties, formally paved the way for the introduction of higher education into the province beginning in 1976.The results further show that the establishment of this faculty faced serious challenges. The lack of adequate educational infrastructure, shortages of land and water, limited laboratory and instructional equipment, insufficient specialized personnel, and the political crisis of the final years of the Pahlavi regime confronted the Ilam Faculty of Animal Husbandry campus with numerous difficulties. Nevertheless, despite these obstacles, the establishment of this campus became an entry point for the subsequent development of higher education in the province and ultimately for the founding of Ilam University in the two decades following the victory of the Islamic Revolution.