Below is a list of the 10 largest universities in the world :-
1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 2. Stanford University, 3. Harvard University, 4. University of Oxford , 5. California Institute of Technology (Caltech), 6. ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, 7. University of Cambridge , 8.University College London, 9. Imperial College London, 10. The University of Chicago.
1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Incorporated in the year 1861, Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research institute located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 1865, four years after the approval of its founding charter, the Institute admitted its first student and shortly thereafter in 1871, admitted its first woman student.
MIT’s opening marked the foundation of a new kind of independent educational institution by coupling teaching and research with a primary focus on solving real-world problems. There are 30 departments across 5 schools in MIT, pioneering new ways of learning on the campus.
With more than 1,067 Faculty members, MIT continues to play a vital role in shaping the future of undergraduate and graduate students as advisors, mentors, coaches, committee members and much more.
2. Stanford University.
officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The university was founded in 1885 by Leland and Jane Stanford in memory of their only child, Leland Stanford Jr., who had died of typhoid fever at age 15 the previous year.
Stanford was a U.S. Senator and former Governor of California who made his fortune as a railroad tycoon. The school admitted its first students on October 1, 1891, as a coeducational and non-denominational institution.
Stanford University struggled financially after the death of Leland Stanford in 1893 and again after much of the campus was damaged by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Following World War II, Provost Frederick Terman supported faculty and graduates’ entrepreneurialism to build self-sufficient local industry in what would later be known as Silicon Valley.
The university is also one of the top fundraising institutions in the country, becoming the first school to raise more than a billion dollars in a year.
3. Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, clergyman John Harvard, Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States & one of the most prestigious in the world.
The Massachusetts Great and General Court authorized Harvard’s founding. In its early years, Harvard College primarily trained Congregational and Unitarian clergy, although it has never been formally affiliated with any denomination.
Its curriculum and student body were gradually secularized during the 18th century, and by the 19th century, Harvard had emerged as the central cultural establishment among Boston elites. Following the American Civil War, President Charles W. Eliot’s long tenure (1869–1909) transformed the college and affiliated professional schools into a modern research university; Harvard was a founding member of the Association of American Universities in 1900.
4. University of Oxford
The University of Oxford (legally The Chancellor Masters and Scholars of 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 in 1209, some academics fled north-east to Cambridge where they established what became the University of Cambridge.The two English “ancient universities” are often jointly called “Oxbridge”.
The university is made up of 39 constituent colleges, six permanent private halls, and a range of academic departments which are organised into four divisions.All the colleges are self-governing institutions within the university, each controlling its own membership and with its own internal structure and activities.
It does not have a main campus, and its buildings and facilities are scattered throughout the city centre. Undergraduate teaching at Oxford is organised around weekly tutorials at the colleges and halls, supported by classes, lectures, seminars, and laboratory work provided by university faculties and departments; some postgraduate teaching, and occasionally undergraduate teaching, includes tutorials organised by faculties and departments.
5. California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
The California Institute of Technology (Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California. It was founded as a preparatory and vocational school by Amos G. Throop in 1891 and began attracting influential scientists such as George Ellery Hale, Arthur Amos Noyes and Robert Andrews Millikan in the early 20th century.
The vocational and preparatory schools were disbanded and spun off in 1910 and the college assumed its present name in 1920. In 1934, Caltech was elected to the Association of American Universities, and the antecedents of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which Caltech continues to manage and operate, were established between 1936 and 1943 under Theodore von Kármán.
The university is one among a small group of institutes of technology in the United States which is primarily devoted to the instruction of pure and applied sciences.
Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphasis on science and engineering, managing $332 million in 2011 in sponsored research. Its 124-acre (50 ha) primary campus is located approximately 11 mi (18 km) northeast of downtown Los Angeles.
6. ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.
ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich; German: Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich; French: École polytechnique fédérale de Zurich; Italian: Politecnico federale di Zurigo) is a public research university in the city of Zürich, Switzerland.
Founded by the Swiss Federal Government in 1854 with the stated mission to educate engineers and scientists, the school focuses exclusively on science, technology, engineering and mathematics.Like its sister institution EPFL, it is part of the Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology Domain (ETH Domain), part of the Swiss Federal Department of Economic Affairs, Education and Research.
In the 2021 edition of the QS World University Rankings ETH Zurich is ranked 6th in the world, and 2nd in Europe and 8th by the Times Higher Education World Rankings 2020.In the 2020 QS World University Rankings by subject it is ranked 4th in the world for engineering and technology (1st in Europe) and 1st for Earth & Marine Science.
7. University of Cambridge .
The University of Cambridge (legally The Chancellor, Masters, and Scholars of the University of Cambridge) is a collegiate research university in Cambridge, United Kingdom. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by King Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world’s fourth-oldest surviving university.The university grew out of an association of scholars who left the University of Oxford after a dispute with the townspeople. The two ‘ancient universities’ share many common features and are often referred to jointly as ‘Oxbridge’.
Cambridge is formed from a variety of institutions which include 31 semi-autonomous constituent Colleges and over 100 academic departments organised into six schools. Cambridge University Press, a department of the university, is the second-largest university press in the world.
Cambridge Assessment, also a department of the university, is one of the world’s leading examining bodies and provides assessment to over eight million learners globally every year.
The university also operates eight cultural and scientific museums, including the Fitzwilliam Museum, as well as a botanic garden. Cambridge’s libraries, of which there are 116, hold a total of around 16 million books, around nine million of which are in Cambridge University Library, a legal deposit library.
8.University College London.
University College London, officially known as UCL since 2005, is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom. It is a member institution of the federal University of London, and is the third largest university in the United Kingdom by total enrolment, and the largest by postgraduate enrolment.
Established in 1826 as London University by founders inspired by the radical ideas of Jeremy Bentham, UCL was the first university institution to be established in London, and the first in England to be entirely secular and to admit students regardless of their religion.
UCL also makes the contested claims of being the third-oldest university in England and the first to admit women. In 1836 UCL became one of the two founding colleges of the University of London, which was granted a royal charter in the same year.
9. Imperial College London.
Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London. Dating back to the Royal College of Chemistry’s foundation in 1845, Imperial grew out of Prince Albert‘s vision of an area for culture, including the Royal Albert Hall, Imperial Institute, numerous museums, and the Royal Colleges that would go on to form the college.
In 1907, Imperial College was established by Royal Charter, merging the Royal College of Science, Royal School of Mines, and City and Guilds College. In 1988, the Imperial College School of Medicine was formed by combining with St Mary’s Hospital Medical School. In 2004, Queen Elizabeth II opened the Imperial College Business School.
The college focuses exclusively on science, technology, medicine and business. The college’s main campus is located in South Kensington, and it has an innovation campus in White City, a research field station at Silwood Park, and teaching hospitals throughout London.
The college was a member of the University of London from 1908, becoming independent on its centenary in 2007. Imperial has an international community, with more than 59% of students from outside the UK and 140 countries represented on campus.
10. The University of Chicago.
The University of Chicago (UChicago, U of C, or Chicago) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 1890, the school is located on a 217-acre (88-hectare) campus in Chicago’s Hyde Park neighborhood.
The university is composed of the undergraduate college as well as various graduate programs and interdisciplinary committees organized into five academic research divisions. Beyond the arts and sciences,
The university has additional campuses and centers in London, Paris, Beijing, Delhi, and Hong Kong, as well as in downtown Chicago.
University of Chicago scholars have played a major role in the development of many academic disciplines, including economics, law, literary criticism, mathematics, religion, sociology, and the behavioralism school of political science, establishing the Chicago schools in various fields.