Vanguard University of Southern California

The Vanguard University of Southern California is an accredited, private, non-profit Christian university of liberal arts and professional studies in Costa Mesa, California, United States.

Vanguard University was the first-four year college in Orange County and offers over 30 undergraduate degrees and emphases in 15 different departments. Vanguard University also offers adult-learning programs in its professional studies department and features six graduate degrees. It is accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC).

In summer 1920, Harold K. Needham, D. W. Kerr, and W. C. Pierce opened Southern California Bible School, an institution intended to prepare Christian workers for the various ministries of the church. 

The school moved from Los Angeles to Pasadena in 1927 and was chartered by the State of California in 1939 to grant degrees. Given this new distinction, the former Southern California Bible School became Southern California Bible College, the first four-year institution of the Assemblies of God.

 In 1943 the college received recognition by the government for the training of military chaplains. It moved to the present campus in 1950, becoming the first four-year college in Orange County. Its name was changed to Southern California College nine years later when majors in the liberal arts were added to the curriculum.

Vanguard University teams, nicknamed athletically as the Lions, are part of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), primarily competing in the Golden State Athletic Conference (GSAC). Men's athletics has six teams and women's athletics has seven.

In 2014, Vanguard won the NAIA Division I men's basketball championship in Kansas City, Missouri. In 2008, the women's basketball team won the NAIA Division I National Championship in Jackson, Tennessee.