Top Universities

Harvard is USA’s oldest institution of higher learning, founded 1636 which it means 140 years before the Declaration of Independence was signed. They say "our mission, to advance new ideas and promote enduring knowledge, has kept the University young. We strive to create an academic environment in which outstanding students and scholars from around the world are continually challenged and inspired to do their best possible work."

is a private university,
established on september 8 1636
Acamdemic term is semester
$29.2 billlion is their annual income
Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust  is the president (current)
location : Cambridge ,Massachusetts, USA
John Harvard is the mascot for harvard university
2400 professors serves about 6700 undergraduate and 12,400 graduate students.
Crimson the color of school,
Average Course Fees (Undergraduate Courses)       $ 27,448
Average Course Fees (Postgraduate Courses)     $ 27,488
Number of Students      24,648
Number of International Students     3,840

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The University of Edunburgh has been offering education to students for over 400 years, continually developing to meet their changing needs and expectations.

The University of Edinburgh strives to offer the best educational experience possible. Their exceptional staff and facilities, unique history, cutting-edge research, location in Scotland’s amazing capital and the mix of students all help to make your learning experience good.

The University of Edinburgh is not only successful in Scotland, or even the UK, but is succesful and famous world-wide. They have a well-deserved international reputation for excellence, such as the work with Stanford University on Informatics. Many of the degree programmes offer the opportunity to spend some time studying abroad. Perhaps this international dimension helps explain why they have the largest proportion of international students of any Scottish university.

The University of Edinburgh was established in 1583, and is therefore one of Scotland’s ancient universities. The University provides over 350 different first degree programmes, including over 200 joint degree combinations, spread across some 100 academic disciplines. More than 22,000 students study here, from all over the world and from a variety of backgrounds. The University has 21 Schools in three Colleges: Humanities & Social Science, Medicine & Veterinary Medicine, and Science & Engineering.

Edinburgh, Scotland’s capital city, is one of the greenest and architecturally most beautiful cities in Northern Europe
They come not only for the architecture, but for a city rich in social, cultural, learning and sporting facilities. Each year the city plays host to internationally renowned events such as the Edinburgh International Arts, Fringe, Film, TV and Science Festivals.

With over 23,000 students, 5,800 from an international background and about 137 nationalities, Edinburgh University has a very cosmopolitan and diverse student community.

Fees:
College of Humanities & Social Sciences: £9,400 per annum (£ 4,950 per semester)

College of Science & Engineering: £12,550 per annum (£ 6,525 per semester)

Fees For New EU Students 2007-08

• For Undergraduate students from the EU the fees for 2007/08 are: £1,735 for the full academic year. Please note that there is a different fee for continuing students from EU countries. Please refer to the Registry website for full details: www.registry.ed.ac.uk/fees/.

  EU students can apply to the Student Awards Agency for Scotland (SAAS) to cover the payment of these fees, but after graduation each student will asked to pay a ‘graduate endowment’ back to the SAAS. In 2006/07 the graduate endowment charge was set at £2,289. Link to the SAAS website here.

• Postgraduate fees for EU applicants (2007/08) are listed on the Registry website: www.registry.ed.ac.uk/fees/
• Visiting Students from the EU: fees for 2007/08 are £1,735 for the full academic year (50% of this rate is charged for students here for only one semester. Please note the SAAS do not cover payment of tuition fees for Visiting students.

From the University Website:

The University’s mission is the advancement and dissemination of knowledge and understanding. As a leading international centre of academic excellence, the University has as its core mission:

• to sustain and develop its position as a research and teaching institution of the highest international quality and to benchmark its performance against world-class standards;
• to provide an outstanding educational environment, supporting study across a broad range of academic disciplines and serving the major professions;
• to produce graduates equipped for high personal and professional achievement; and
• to contribute to society, promoting health, economic and cultural wellbeing.

As a great civic university, Edinburgh especially values its intellectual and economic relationship with the Scottish community that forms its base and provides the foundation from which it will continue to look to the widest international horizons, enriching both itself and Scotland.

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Canterbury Christ Church University is renowned for academic excellence, a warm welcoming atmosphere and community spirit. This is a modern, friendly university with a wide range of undergraduate, postgraduate and other programmes.

In addition to our city-centre campus at Canterbury we have campuses at Broadstairs, Medway – part of the Universities at Medway project – Tunbridge Wells (Salomons Campus) and University Centre Folkestone – which will open in September 2007. Teaching and research work is grouped within four major faculties: Arts and Humanities, Business and Sciences, Education and Health and Social Care.

The University offers excellent teaching facilities and residential accommodation in unique locations with attractive environments.

Whilst we are proud to remain a Church of England foundation, we welcome students of all faiths and none, all cultures and nationalities.

With a student population of over 14,000 the University is now the largest centre of higher education in Kent for the public services – notably teacher training, policing, health and social care.

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History of Berkeley University
   
The roots of the University of California go back to the gold rush days of 1849, when the drafters of the State Constitution, a group of vigorous and farsighted people, required the legislature to "encourage by all suitable means the promotion of intellectual, scientific, moral and agricultural improvement" of the people of California. These early planners dreamed of a university which eventually, "if properly organized and conducted, would contribute even more than California’s gold to the glory and happiness of advancing generations."

The university that was born nearly 20 years later was the product of a merger between the College of California (a private institution) and the Agricultural, Mining, and Mechanical Arts College (a land grant institution). The College of California, founded by former Congregational minister Henry Durant from New England, was incorporated in 1855 in Oakland. Its curriculum was modeled after that of Yale and Harvard, with the addition of modern languages to the core courses in Latin, Greek, history, English, mathematics, and natural history. With an eye to future expansion, the board of trustees augmented the college’s Oakland holdings with the purchase of 160 acres of land four miles north, on a site they named Berkeley in 1866. (Cal’s Charter was introduced in 1868.) This original tract was to be considerably expanded over the years.

While the College of California was in its infancy, efforts continued in the state legislature to create a public educational institution, and in 1866 the legislature took advantage of the federal Morrill Land Grant Act of 1862 to establish the Agricultural, Mining, and Mechanical Arts College. The college was to teach agricultural, mechanical arts, and military tactics "to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions in life." Scientific and classical studies were not to be excluded but were of secondary importance.

The boards of trustees of the College of California and the Agricultural, Mining, and Mechanical Arts College decided to merge the two schools to their mutual advantage — one had land but insufficient funds and the other had ample public funds but no land-on the condition that the curricula of both schools be blended to form "a complete university." On March 23, 1868, the governor signed into law the Organic Act that created the University of California. The new university used the former College of California’s buildings in Oakland until South Hall and North Hall were completed on the Berkeley site (South Hall is still standing), and in September 1873 the University, with an enrollment of 191 students, moved to Berkeley.

Fiscal problems plagued the new University, and it was not until the 20-year presidency of Benjamin Ide Wheeler beginning in 1899 that finances stabilized, allowing the University to grow in size and distinction. Early in this period Phoebe Apperson Hearst, one of the University’s most generous benefactors, conceived of and financed an unparalleled — indeed, scarcely believable — opportunity for architects, an international competition for campus architectural plans that, she stipulated, "should be worthy of the great University whose material home they are to provide for."

The competition, won by Emile Bénard of Paris, brought Berkeley not only a building plan but worldwide notoriety. The London Spectator wrote, "On the face of it this is a grand scheme, reminding one of those famous competitions in Italy in which Brunelleschi and Michaelangelo took part. The conception does honor to the nascent citizenship of the Pacific states. . . ." At Oxford University, which at the time was strapped for funds, a Latin orator said, "There is brought a report that in California there is already established a university furnished with so great resources that even to the architects (a lavish kind of men) full permission has been given to spare no expense. Amidst the most pleasant hills on an elevated site, commanding a wide sea view, is to be placed a home of Universal Science and a seat of the muses."

John Galen Howard, the supervising architect charged with implementing the Bénard plan, took advantage of his "permission to spare no expense" and developed a style of architecture that reinterpreted the grace, dignity, and austerity of classical lines to suit the California environment. Some of the campus’s most elegant and stately structures were built during Howard’s tenure, among them the Hearst Memorial Mining Building (1902-7), the Hearst Greek Theatre (1903), California Hall (1905), Doe Library (1911-17), the Campanile (1914), Wheeler Hall (1917), Gilman Hall (1917), and Hilgard Hall (1918).

President Wheeler, a classical scholar and able administrator, attracted library and scholarship funds, research grants, and a distinguished faculty to the University, and its reputation grew, particularly in the fields of agriculture, the humanities, and engineering. Many new departments were added in the early years of his presidency, and existing departments expanded. Summer sessions were begun in 1899 to train physics and chemistry teachers and before long broadened their scope.

The University grew with the rapidly expanding population of California and responded to the educational needs of the developing state. In the early 1900s the University’s new College of Commerce (now the Haas School of Business) trained students for export trade with the Orient and funneled graduates into industries and businesses throughout the state. During the same period a foreign service training program was developed in response to State Department concern about the poor quality of consular personnel.

In 1930 Robert Gordon Sproul began a presidency that lasted three decades. His principal concern was academic excellence, and he was committed to attracting brilliant faculty in all fields. His success was particularly evident in the physical and biological sciences.

In the 1930s research on campus burgeoned in nuclear physics, chemistry, and biology, leading to the development of the first cyclotron by Ernest O. Lawrence, the isolation of the human polio virus, and the discovery of a string of elements heavier than uranium. Twenty members of the Berkeley faculty have been awarded Nobel Prizes for these and subsequent discoveries, as well as in literature and economics, for liberal arts kept pace with physical sciences. In 1966 Berkeley was recognized by the American Council on Education as "the best balanced distinguished university in the country."

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The University of Auckland was established in 1883 and is New Zealand’s largest university.  Since it’s foundation, it has become an international centre of learning and academic excellence and is New Zealand’s leading research-led university.

The University is New Zealand’s top-ranked tertiary institution based on research quality. The Performance-Based Research Fund review, released in 2004 by the Tertiary Education Commission, concluded that: "On virtually any measure, The University of Auckland is the country’s leading research university. Not only did it achieve the highest quality score of any TEO [tertiary education organisation], but it also has by far the largest share of A-rated researchers in the country."

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