Portal:University of Oxford
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The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in continuous operation. It grew rapidly from 1167, when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk, some Oxford academics fled northeast to Cambridge, where, in 1209, they established the University of Cambridge. The two English ancient universities share many common features and are jointly referred to as Oxbridge.
The University of Oxford is made up of 43 constituent colleges, consisting of 36 semi-autonomous colleges, four permanent private halls and three societies (colleges that are departments of the university, without their own royal charter), and a range of academic departments which are organised into four divisions. Each college is a self-governing institution within the university, controlling its own membership and having its own internal structure and activities. All students are members of a college. The university does not have a main campus, but its buildings and facilities are scattered throughout the city centre. Undergraduate teaching at Oxford consists of lectures, small-group tutorials at the colleges and halls, seminars, laboratory work and occasionally further tutorials provided by the central university faculties and departments. Postgraduate teaching is provided in a predominantly centralised fashion.
Oxford operates the Ashmolean Museum, the world's oldest university museum; Oxford University Press, the largest university press in the world; and the largest academic library system nationwide. In the fiscal year ending 31 July 2023, the university had a total consolidated income of £2.92 billion, of which £789 million was from research grants and contracts.
Oxford has educated a wide range of notable alumni, including 31 prime ministers of the United Kingdom and many heads of state and government around the world. As of October 2022,[update] 73 Nobel Prize laureates, 4 Fields Medalists, and 6 Turing Award winners have matriculated, worked, or held visiting fellowships at the University of Oxford, while its alumni have won 160 Olympic medals. Oxford is the home of numerous scholarships, including the Rhodes Scholarship, one of the oldest international graduate scholarship programmes. (Full article...)
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The history of Brasenose College starts in 1509 when the college was founded on the site of Brasenose Hall by Richard Sutton and Bishop William Smyth. Its name is believed to derive from a bronze knocker (replica pictured) on the hall's door. The library and chapel were completed in the mid-seventeenth century, despite continuing financial problems. Under William Cleaver (Principal 1785–1809), the college began to be populated by gentlemen, its income doubled and academic success was considerable. New Quad was built between 1886 and 1911. Under Edward Hartopp Cradock Brasenose's academic record waned but it excelled at cricket and rowing; the reverse occurred under Charles Buller Heberden. Brasenose lost 115 men in the First World War and Lord Curzon's post-War reforms were successfully instituted. Sporting achievements again came at the cost of falling academic standards and finances. The 1970s saw the admission of women beginning in 1974, more post-graduate attendees and fewer domestic staff. Law and Philosophy, Politics and Economics were strong subjects under Principals Barry Nicholas and Herbert Hart) and the fellowship of Vernon Bogdanor. (Full article...)
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St Edmund Hall, often referred to as "Teddy Hall", was established at some point in the 13th century, probably in about 1278. The college is named after St Edmund of Abingdon, Oxfordshire, the first known Oxford Master of Arts and the first Oxford-educated Archbishop of Canterbury, who lived and taught on the college site. The name St Edmund Hall (Aula Sancti Edmundi) first appears in a 1317 rental agreement. It was the last surviving medieval academic hall at Oxford, only obtaining college status in 1957, and retaining the term "Hall" for reasons of history. It is based on a small central site on the north side of the High Street: the old dining hall dates from 1659, the chapel and old library from the late 17th century, and the library is the 12th-century former church of St Peter-in-the-East. The college has about 375 undergraduates and 175 postgraduates. The Principal is the microbiologist Keith Gull. Alumni of the college include the comedians Terry Jones and Stewart Lee, the former England rugby international Stuart Barnes, the journalist and broadcaster Robin Day, and Ken Macdonald and Keir Starmer, former Directors of Public Prosecutions. (Full article...)
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Did you know
Articles from Wikipedia's "Did You Know" archives about the university and people associated with it:
- ... that the establishment of the Marshal Foch Professorship of French Literature at Oxford was announced a few days after Marshal Foch (pictured) signed the Armistice with Germany to end World War I?
- ... that British international rally driver Tony Ambrose was given an MG sports car by his father for winning a scholarship to Jesus College?
- ... that Bishop Graham Chadwick served as a naval intelligence officer in World War II and was expelled from South Africa for anti-apartheid activism?
- ... that Somerset cricketer Izzy Westbury made her senior international debut for the Netherlands aged 15?
- ... that it was speculated that J. K. Rowling based the Harry Potter character Albus Dumbledore on the "splendidly bearded" T. P. Wiseman, her classics professor at Exeter University?
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