Columbia University

I

Introduction

Columbia University, private, coeducational institution of higher learning in New York City. Columbia is a member of the Ivy League, a prestigious group of colleges in the eastern United States.

II

Undergraduate Activities

The university’s oldest division, Columbia College, offers undergraduate courses leading to bachelor’s degrees. Formerly restricted to male students, the college became coeducational in 1983. Barnard College for women became affiliated with the university in 1890.

III

Graduate and Professional Schools

The school of medicine, founded in 1767 and later merged with the College of Physicians and Surgeons, is now part of a health sciences complex that includes schools of dentistry, nursing, and public health, located in northern Manhattan. Other graduate and professional schools were established in the following order: law; engineering; architecture; social work; journalism (endowed in 1912 by American journalist and newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer); business; dramatic, musical, and fine arts; and international and public affairs. Affiliated schools include Teachers College and Union Theological Seminary.

Outside the city, Columbia University maintains Nevis Laboratory, for research in physics, and Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, which offers extensive geophysics and oceanography facilities.

---

---

IV

History and Administration

Established in 1754 as King’s College under a charter granted by King George II of Great Britain, the school reopened as Columbia College after the American Revolution (1775-1783). Originally situated in lower Manhattan, it moved in 1897 to Morningside Heights on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Notable institutional advances occurred during the university presidencies of Frederick Augustus Porter Barnard, from 1864 to 1889, and Seth Low, from 1890 to 1901; the modern reputation of the university was established during the long tenure of Nicholas Murray Butler, from 1902 to 1945. Dwight D. Eisenhower served as university president from 1948 to 1953, before becoming president of the United States.

	More from Encarta
	•  Presidential Myths Quiz •  Coffee break: Recharge your brain