East Bay has a Catholic church, St. Mary of the Assumption Church, with mass every day at 10am and Saturday at 4pm. The community was the site of the College of East Bay (1824-1829) which was moved to Arichat and later Antigonish where it became St. Francis Xavier University. St FX later opened a branch in Cape Breton which became the University College of Cape Breton, later Cape Breton University. Until recently, East Bay had two elementary schools, reduced to one, and now both closed.[3]