Occidental College (informally Oxy) is a private liberal arts college in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1887 as a coeducational college by clergy and members of the Presbyterian Church, it became non-sectarian in 1910. It is one of the oldest liberal arts colleges on the West Coast of the United States.

Occidental's current campus is located in Eagle Rock, Los Angeles, and was designed by architect Myron Hunt. Due to its proximity to Hollywood and its architecture, the campus is frequently used as a filming location for film and television productions. Occidental is a founding member of the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference and its 20 varsity sports teams compete in NCAA Division III. The college's curriculum emphasizes diversity, global literacy, and civic engagement.

Notable alumni include President Barack Obama, a Cabinet member, several members of the United States Congress, CEOs of notable companies, 10 Rhodes Scholars, and recipients of the Pulitzer Prize, Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Tony Award and Emmy Award.

History Early history

Occidental College was founded on April 20, 1887, by a group of Presbyterian clergy, missionaries, and laymen, including James George Bell, Lyman Stewart, and Thomas Bard. The cornerstone of the school's first building was laid in September 1887 in the Boyle Heights now East Los Angeles neighborhood of Los Angeles. The college's first term began a year later with 27 male and 13 female students, and tuition of $50 a year.

In 1896, the Boyle Heights building was destroyed by fire. The college temporarily relocated to the old St. Vincent's College campus on Hill Street before a new site was selected in Highland Park in 1898. Eventually, the college erected three main buildings: the Academy Building, the Stimson Library, and the Hall of Arts and Letters (the Hall still stands today, converted to apartments). The Highland Park site was also bisected by the tracks of the Santa Fe Railroad, and was the site of two presidential visits, first by William Howard Taft in 1909 and subsequently by Theodore Roosevelt in 1911.

In 1909, the Pomona College Board of Trustees suggested a merger between Pomona and Occidental, but the proposal came to nothing. The following year, the college severed formal ties with the Presbyterian Church and became a non-sectarian, non-denominational institution. The small size of the campus and the disruption caused by frequent freight trains pushed the college's trustees to find a new location.

1900s

In 1912, the school began construction of a new campus located in Los Angeles' Eagle Rock neighborhood. The Eagle Rock campus was designed by noted California architect Myron Hunt, also known as the planner of the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) campus and as designer of the Huntington Library and Art Gallery and the Rose Bowl. That same year, Occidental President John Willis Baer announced the trustees' decision to convert Occidental College into an all-men's institution. The plans were met with widespread backlash from students and faculty who protested the change. The community outcry garnered national headlines and the board later dropped the proposal.

Two weeks after Booker T. Washington came to visit Occidental, on March 27, 1914, Swan, Fowler, and Johnson Halls were dedicated at its new Eagle Rock campus. Patterson Field, today one of the oldest collegiate sports stadiums in Los Angeles, was opened in 1916. In April 1917, shortly after the United States entered World War I, the college formed a Students Army Training Corps to aid the war effort.

Under Occidental President Remsen Bird, the school opened a series of new Hunt-designed buildings, including Clapp Library (1924), Hillside Theatre and a women's dormitory (Orr Hall) in 1925, Alumni Gymnasium (1926), the Freeman Student Union (1928) and a music and speech building (1929). The Delta of California chapter of Phi Beta Kappa was established at Occidental in 1926, at a time when the only other chapters in California were at Stanford, UC Berkeley, and Pomona.

English novelist Aldous Huxley, who had spoken at Occidental's convocation ceremony in the then-new Thorne Hall in 1938, lampooned President Remsen Bird as Dr. Herbert Mulge of Tarzana College in his 1939 novel, After Many a Summer Dies the Swan. Huxley was never again invited back to campus.

During World War II, many students left Occidental to fight in the war. In July 1943, the U.S. Navy established a Navy V-12 officer training program on campus that produced hundreds of graduates before it was disbanded in 1945 at the end of the war. Occidental President Remsen Bird worked behind the scenes to help Oxy students of Japanese descent continue their education despite mandatory evacuation orders; his letters are included in the Japanese American Relocation Collection in Clapp Library.

After having its first Rhodes Scholar, Clarence Spaulding, named in 1908, Oxy seniors John Paden and Aaron Segal were awarded Rhodes Scholarships in 1958, the only time Occidental has produced two Rhodes Scholars in a single year. Paden and Segal were among the ten Occidental students who participated in Crossroads Africa that year, a forerunner to the Peace Corps that later became a national program.

In 1969, 42 students were suspended for peacefully protesting military recruiting on campus. One year later, faculty voted to suspend classes in the wake of the Kent State shootings and America's invasion of Cambodia. Subsequently, Oxy students wrote 7,000 letters to Washington D.C., protesting U.S. involvement in the war in Southeast Asia. Occidental launched one of the country's first Upward Bound programs in 1966, aimed at increasing the number of low-income, underrepresented high school students who become the first in their family to go to college.

Also in 1969, the school opened its first two co-ed dormitories, and two more followed a year later. In 1988, John Brooks Slaughter, formerly Chancellor of the University of Maryland, became Occidental's first black president. Building on faculty and student advocacy and a series of grants the college had received previously to increase the diversity of the Occidental student body, Slaughter led the process of creating a new mission statement that is still used today. Also, Slaughter led the college's community outreach expansion with the creation of the Center for Volunteerism and Community Service, the predecessor for the current Center for Community Based Learning.

In November 1990, the college rededicated the campus' main chapel as the Herrick Memorial Chapel and Interfaith Center. The school also took down the crosses in the chapel in an attempt to "broaden Occidental's appeal among non-Christian students."

2000s In July 2006, Susan Westerberg Prager became Occidental's first female president. She left her position in 2007. Robert Skotheim served as interim president. In July 2009, Jonathan Veitch became Occidental's 15th president, and the first native Angeleno president.

The college received national scrutiny in 2014 when the U.S. Department of Education named Occidental College as one of 55 higher education institutions under investigation "for possible violations of federal law over the handling of sexual violence and harassment." In response to student and faculty outcry the college adopted a new interim sexual misconduct policy, hired a former assistant district attorney as a full-time, independent Title IX coordinator, and added a new 24-hour, 7-days-a-week telephone hotline. The school also created a permanent Sexual Misconduct Advisory Board made up of students, faculty, and staff. Two years later, the investigation was concluded with the Office of Civil Rights finding that "the preponderance of the evidence does not support a conclusion that the College violated Title IX, except with respect to the issue of promptness in several cases during the 2012-13 school years."

President Barack Obama attended Occidental for two years prior to transferring to Columbia University. In 2015, "birthers" falsely claimed that Obama's Occidental College transcript revealed he received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia after the resurgence of a fake news story from 2009.

In July 2020, Harry J. Elam Jr., formerly vice provost for undergraduate education and Drama professor at Stanford University, became Occidental's 16th president. In August 2023, it was announced that he will retire in 2024 for health-related reasons. On March 26, 2024, it was announced that Tom Stritikus, late of Fort Lewis College, will become Occidental's president effective July 1.

Campus Architect Myron Hunt created the original campus master plan for Occidental's Eagle Rock campus in 1911. He structured the campus in a Mediterranean style, with covered walkways and tile roofs. The campus landscape was designed and developed by Beatrix Farrand in the late 1930s. All of the 19 buildings designed by Hunt remain in use today.

The campus is noted for the outdoor Remsen Bird Amphitheater, where between 1960 and 1996 plays and musicals were performed in the summer. Financial cutbacks caused the theater department to end the summer festival programs. Since 1996 the Occidental Children's Theater has performed there each summer.

Occidental College was ranked as the sixth "Most Beautiful" campus by Newsweek in 2012. The campus is home to a 1-megawatt ground-mounted solar array, which is the largest hillside array on an American college campus and the largest of its kind in Los Angeles. The 4,886-panel installation was completed in Spring 2013 and inaugurated on the school's 126-year anniversary.

Academics

There are more than 40 majors offered on campus (and nine minor-only programs, including Public Health, Linguistics, and Classical Studies) and a 9:1 student–faculty ratio. The average class size is 18 students and most students take four classes per semester. the most popular majors, based on 2021 graduates, were Econometrics & Quantitative Economics (46), Psychology (38), Biology/Biological Sciences (37), Political Science & Government (34), Environmental Studies (31), International Relations and Affairs (31).

Rankings

Since 1908, Occidental has graduated ten Rhodes Scholars. In U.S. News & World Report's 2025 rankings of American liberal arts colleges, Occidental was tied for 34th overall, tied for 18th in "Top Performers in Social Mobility," 71st for "Best Value," and tied at 102nd for "Economics." The 2017 edition of the Fiske Guide to Colleges gave Occidental four-star ratings (out of five) in academics and quality of life. Princeton Review's The Best 381 Colleges 2017 Edition gave Occidental ratings of 91 (out of 100) in academics and quality of life and 95 in financial aid. In Forbes 2019 ranking of America's Top Colleges, Occidental ranks 102nd out of 650 liberal arts colleges, universities and service academies. Kiplinger's "Best College Values 2019" rankings places Occidental 58th among 149 liberal arts colleges.

Admissions Fall admission statistics 2024202320222021202020192018201720162015201420132012Applicants6,4616,5736,3056,4956,9397,5017,2817,2816,7756,4095,9116,0716,072Admits2,8542,6222,4842,4842,8382,7522,7162,7162,8312,9362,6522,5522,574Admit rate44.2%39.9%39.4%38.2%40.9%36.7%37.3%37.3%41.7%45.8%44.8%42.0%42.3%Enrolled509532531535402562566566502517546548530 U.S. News deemed Occidental's admissions "more selective," with the class of 2020 acceptance rate being 37.3%. Of those admitted submitting such data, 52% were in the top 10% of their high school class. The SAT 25th–75th percentile scores were 1810–2120. Of those admitted to the class of 2020, 50% identified as persons of color, and 13% of those admitted were international students.