East Bay college clears debts for some graduating students

By John Ramos

Contra Costa College in San Pablo is wiping out the debt that some of its graduating students owe them.

As students head toward the end of the school year, they have a lot on their minds: finals, graduation, and, of course, what comes next? But for many of the graduates, there is now one less thing to worry about, and it came in an announcement on Monday.

“Today, we’ve got a surprise for you,” said college president Dr. Kimberly Rogers, in a video sent to students. “Thanks to the CCC Foundation and its generous donors, any debt you have to the college is officially eliminated. It’s true. No joke.”

Dr. Rogers said this was done once before, in 2021, when everyone was struggling to get past the pandemic. She said it felt like the time was right to do it again.

“We came up with this this spring,” she said. “It’s been a really tough year for a lot of people, between the economy and lots happening in the world. And we thought this would be a wonderful surprise again for the students.”

The gift is for graduating students who don’t qualify for free tuition, mainly because they have to work and cannot attend full-time.  That described Alexander Walker-Griffin back in 2021. He’s now the Vice Mayor of the city of Hercules, but back then, his $4,000 debt to the college was holding up his transcript, which he needed to transfer to St. Mary’s College.

“And this pending piece of paper that needed to come in the mail was the biggest thing holding me back,” he said.  “So, this was a huge sigh of relief once it came in!”

Sara Marcellino is Executive Director of the Contra Costa College Foundation, which donated the $31,000 for the gift. The offer involves 181 students who owed a range of $2 to close to a $1,000. Marcellino said it’s the kind of thing that makes people happy to donate.

“Wiping out debt feels good,” said Marcellino. “We were able to say to our students, ‘Look, not only do we care about you financially, but we just care about you and your success and what you’re going to do in the future.'”

Mona Taleb-Agha appreciates that. She’s about to graduate and got the text message on her phone. Although she admitted she didn’t really know what it meant at the time.

“I’ve been to other campuses in the district, and I would say this is my favorite one because I think it provides students with a lot of resources that you wouldn’t get elsewhere,” she said. “I do think they put a lot of effort into making sure all their students are cared for.”

That’s not always the feeling you get on the huge university campuses, like UC Berkeley, with its tens of thousands of students. But Alexander Walker-Griffin said it should be, considering how much more money they have to work with.

“You know, respectfully to the UC’s, I think they should take note of what Contra Costa College is doing,” he said, with a smile.  “I mean, they’re about 10 minutes away, so I think they should take note of what’s happening here in San Pablo and Richmond!”

Marcellino said the debt forgiveness has to be done sparingly and on a surprise basis, or no one would ever pay their fees. But she said they do plan on doing it again sometime, and in the meantime, they’re inviting donations to the foundation for when that day comes.