University

Columbia University

Founded in 1754 as King’s College by Royal Charter of King George II of England, Columbia is the oldest university in the state of New York and one of the oldest in the US.
Its main landmark is the Low Memorial Library, which was built in the Roman Classical style and still houses the university’s central administration offices. As well as its main campus in the heart of New York City on Broadway, Columbia has two facilities outside Manhattan: Nevis Laboratories, a centre for the study of high-energy experimental particle and nuclear physics in Irvington, New York, and the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, New York.
More than 80 faculty members, adjunct staff and alumni of Columbia have won a Nobel prize since 1901, when the awards were first granted. These include chemist Robert Lefkowitz, economist Joseph Stiglitz and US President Barack Obama, who was given the Peace Prize in 2009. Columbia has also educated Founding Father of the US Alexander Hamilton, US presidents Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt and actors Jake Gyllenhaal, Katie Holmes and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. The private research-based university has 20 schools – which include architecture, planning and preservation; business; Jewish theological seminary; and law – and 23 libraries that are scattered across the city. Sponsored research from its medical centre produces more than $600 million annually.
Columbia Technology Ventures, the institution’s technology transfer office, manages more than 400 new inventions each year and has been involved in launching over 150 start-up companies based on Columbia’s technologies. The university also has nine Columbia Global Centres, which aim to promote and facilitate collaboration between the university’s staff, students and alumni in order to address global challenges. These are in China, Jordan, Turkey, Kenya, India, France, Chile, Brazil and New York City. In 2014-15, the university’s total endowment value passed the $9.6 billion mark. Lee Bollinger became Columbia University’s 19th president in 2002, making him the longest-serving leader of an Ivy League institution.

University College London

University College London (UCL) was founded in 1826 to bring higher education to those who were typically excluded from it. In 1878, it became the first university in England to admit women on equal terms as men.

Located in the heart of London, UCL is a constituent college of the University of London and a member of the Russell Group, with approximately 850 professors and over 6,000 academic and research staff.

UCL comprises 11 faculties: Arts and Humanities, Built Environment, Brain Sciences, Engineering, the Institute of Education, Laws, Life Sciences, Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Medical Sciences, Population Health Sciences, and Social and Historical Sciences.

Throughout its history, UCL has been the birthplace of numerous significant scientific discoveries, with 29 Nobel Prizes awarded to UCL students or staff, including William Ramsay, who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1904 for his discovery of the noble gases.

In addition, the UCL academic community includes 53 Fellows of the Royal Society, 51 Fellows of the British Academy, 15 Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering, and 117 Fellows of the Academy of Medical Sciences.

The student body is nearly 36,000-strong and UCL has one of the largest systems of postgraduate study in the country. Nearly 52 per cent of students are engaged in graduate studies.

Students hail from approximately 150 countries worldwide making up more than one-third of the university’s entire student population.

UCL was the first British university to open a campus in Doha, Qatar, where it runs a centre for the study of cultural heritage. It also has a presence in Adelaide, South Australia, which includes a space science and an energy policy institute.

UCL alumni include film director Derek Jarman, the writer Lynne Truss, Baroness Patricia Scotland, who became the UK’s first female Attorney General, and Marie Stopes, who founded Britain’s first family planning clinic.

The university’s Latin motto translates as ‘Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward.’