In 1954 construction began for the new 83-acre campus located at 2600 Mission Bell Drive, San Pablo and the first classes started Fall of 1956. The Contra Costa Junior College District is 686 square miles spread across the rolling hills of San Pablo and Richmond overlooking San Pablo Bay.
Contra Costa College became an academic and community focal point for advocacy, social awareness and the arts. The campus has attracted noteable speakers such as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Dr. Benjamin Spock, Buckminster Fuller, Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael, Eldridge Cleaver and Dick Gregory. And when the Oakland Symphony performed on campus in the John and Jean Knox Center for thePerforming Arts audiences came from throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.
Today, the diversity of the college community is reflected by the wide range of ages of the student body that comes to Contra Costa College from over 20 different countries and speaks over fourty languages.
The college is nationally recognized for its Center for Science Excellence Mentoring Program, the Journalism Department’s award winning newspaper “The Advocate” and its highly successful Nursing Program that was established in 1949.