Oxford University

The University of Oxford is a public research university located in Oxford, England, United Kingdom. With the exact date of its founding unknown, there is evidence of a teaching institution as early as 1096, making it the second oldest university in the world and the first in the English-speaking world. The university has grown rapidly since 1167 when Henry II of England forbade English students from attending the University of Paris. As a result of disputes between the students and the people of Oxford in 1209, some professors left north-east for Cambridge, where they founded what would later be the University of Cambridge. These two ancient universities are often referred to together with the nickname "Oxbridge". The history and influence of the University of Oxford has made it one of the most prestigious in the world.

The university is made up of several institutions, 39 constituent colleges and a wide range of academic departments which are organized into four divisions. All colleges are self-governing institutions within the university, they control its members and have their own internal structure and activities. Oxford is a university city that does not have a main campus, as its buildings and faculties are spread throughout the city center. Undergraduate teaching is organized around weekly tutorials in colleges and classrooms, supported by classes, lectures, seminars and laboratory work offered by university faculties and departments. Some postgraduate courses include tutorials also organized by faculties and departments. Oxford has the oldest university museum in the world, as well as the largest university press and the largest national academic library. The University of Oxford is regularly ranked among the best institutions of higher learning in the world according to the evaluations of different organizations.. In fact, according to Times Higher Education (THE) the University since 2017 is listed as the best university in the world.

Oxford has educated many outstanding alumni, including 29 Nobel laureates, 47 UK Prime Ministers and countless heads of state and government from around the world. As of 2017, 69 Nobel Prize winners, 3 Fields Medals and 6 Turing Award winners have studied, worked or collaborated with the University of Oxford. Its students have achieved 160 Olympic medals. Oxford also awards the Rhodes Scholarship, one of the oldest international scholarships.

History

The date of the university's founding is unknown, and it may not have existed as a single event, but there is evidence of teaching activities dating back to 1096. When Henry II of England forbade English students from attending The colleges of higher learning in Paris, in the year 1167, Oxford began to grow rapidly. The foundation of the first student residences, which later became the colleges, dates from this time onwards. After the murder of two students accused of rape in 1209, the University was dissolved. On June 20, 1214, the University returned to Oxford with a letter of acceptance negotiated by Nicholas de Romanis, a papal delegate, and in 1231 received the letter of University.

Oxford University's main rival is the University of Cambridge, founded a short time later. The combination of both institutions is popularly known as Oxbridge. Traditionally, Cambridge has been considered superior in scientific matters, and Oxford in the humanities. Although this is more a perception than a reality, this bias derives from the emphasis that universities have historically given to some disciplines. Both universities belong to the Russell Group of British research universities.

Organization

Oxford is a collegiate university which can be confusing for those unfamiliar with it. The University is essentially a federation of about forty self-governing Halls (Permanent Private Halls) and colleges (in English colleges) with a central administration headed by a Vice Chancellor. The academic departments are attached to its central structure. They do not belong to any particular school. The departments pursue to develop research, provide teaching and learning facilities, organize conferences, seminars and determine the study plans and guidelines for student teaching. Colleges are in charge of organizing academic classes for their undergraduate members. The members of an academic department are spread across different colleges. Certain colleges have certain strengths (for example, Nuffield College specializing in social sciences), but they are the exception, as most have a wide variety of teachers and students from all fields of study. Facilities such as libraries are provided at all levels: by the central structure (the Bodleian Library), by departments (departmental libraries such as the Law School Library) and by colleges (which generally maintain multi-disciplinary libraries for the use of their members.

Oxford's collegiate system originates from the university coming into existence through the gradual agglomeration of independent institutions in the city of Oxford. (See also Colleges of the University of Oxford and the list of Cambridge Sister Colleges.)

In addition to the collegiate level of organization, the university is subdivided into departments by area, like many other universities. Departments play an important role in postgraduate, and increasingly undergraduate, education by offering lectures and classes and organizing assessments. The departments are also research centers, financially supported by external institutions that include the main research councils; although the schools have an interest in research, most are not specialists in any area in terms of organization.

The main legislative body of the university is the Congregation, which is the assembly of all scholars who teach at the university. Another body, the Convocation (in English Convocation), encompasses all graduates of the university, and was the main legislative body of the university. Until 1949, the Convocation elected the two members of Parliament for the University. It now has very limited functions, the main one being to elect the Chancellor of the University (largely symbolic title). The most recent election took place in 2003, when Chris Patten was elected.

The executive body of the university is the University Council. This is made up of the vice-chancellor (Dr. John Hood), the department heads and other members chosen by the Congregation, as well as observers from the Student Union. In addition to the current House of the Congregation, there is also an Old House of the Congregation, which somehow survived the renovations in the 19th century and is today only used for conferring degrees.

The academic year is divided into three periods, each lasting eight weeks. The Michaelmas period runs from early October to December; Hilary usually runs from January to before Easter; and Trinity runs from after Easter to June. These terms are among the shortest of any British university, and the workload is intense.

Schools

The schools are totally independent entities, owners of their properties, with their own staff and their own budget.

There are 39 colleges of the University of Oxford and five halls, each with its own internal structure and activities. All students and the majority of faculty must be members of both the University and a college or hall. Those who preside over the colleges in Oxford are known by various titles (depending on the college), including warden, provost, principal, president, rector, master or dean. The colleges normally meet in the College Conference to discuss administrative and academic policies.

Many of the student service offices are specific to each school, but these are much more than student residences. They provide accommodation, food, libraries, sports and social activities, they also appoint tutors in charge of following the work of the students. On the other hand, the university provides the classes, conducts the exams and awards the degrees. Colleges are responsible for admitting undergraduate students and organizing their academic tutoring. On the contrary, it is the different academic departments that are in charge of training postgraduate students.

The following list shows the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford and its sister colleges at the University of Cambridge:

University Admission

Admission to the university is very rigorous and is based on the academic merits and potential of the candidate. Undergraduate admissions are handled by colleges, working together to ensure that the best students have a place at the university. Selection is made based on school references, personal essays, achieved results, predicted results, written work, written tests, and interviews.^{[citation required]}

The selection of graduate students is made first by the department in which each one will study, and then secondarily by the college to which the department is associated.

Like Cambridge, Oxford has traditionally been seen as a place for the well-to-do, although today that is not the case. The cost of studies, in the days prior to the availability of student scholarships, was prohibitive unless you had a scholarship or left, in the past, a servant (who had to serve his classmates as compensation for his tuition). Grammar and private schools prepared their pupils specifically for entrance exams, and some even went so far as to urge students to stay an extra year studying just for the exam. Pupils from other public schools rarely could afford such a luxury.

Oxford has made great efforts of late to attract public school students, and admission to both Oxford and Cambridge continues to be based on academic merit and potential. About half of Oxford's students come from public schools. However, there is still much public debate in Britain about whether more could be done to appeal to those who come from poorer social classes.

Oxford in the university rankings

Notable graduates and academics

There are many notable 'oxonians' (name given to graduates of the University):

Twenty-six UK Prime Ministers have studied at Oxford University, including William Gladstone, Herbert Asquith, Clement Attlee, Harold Macmillan, Harold Wilson, Edward Heath, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair, David Cameron and Theresa May.

At least thirty international political leaders have studied at Oxford. These include Harald V of Norway, Abdullah II of Jordan, three Prime Ministers of Australia (John Gorton, Malcolm Fraser and Bob Hawke), two Prime Ministers of Canada (Lester B. Pearson, and John Turner), two Prime Ministers of India (Manmohan Singh and Indira Gandhi), four Prime Ministers of Pakistan (Liaquat Ali Khan, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, and Benazir Bhutto), S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike from Sri Lanka, Norman Washington Manley from Jamaica, Eric Williams (Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago), Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (President of Peru), Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre (intellectual, ideologue and founder of APRA), Álvaro Uribe (former president of Colombia), Abhisit Vejjajiva (Prime Minister of Thailand), Bill Clinton and Arthur Mutambara (Deputy Prime Minister of Zimbabwe). Burmese pro-democracy activist and Nobel Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi was a student at St. Hugh's College. Forty-seven Nobel Prize winners have studied in Oxford.

Oxford has also produced twelve saints and twenty Archbishops of Canterbury, including Rowan Williams, who studied at Wadham College and later became Canon Professor at Christ Church. Another religious figure was Mirza Nasir Ahmad, the third Khalifatul Masih of the Commonwealth. Islamic Ahmadiyya and Shoghi Effendi, one of the elected leaders of Baha'ism. The founder of Methodism, John Wesley, studied at Christ Church and was elected a Fellow of Lincoln College.

Some fifty Olympic medalists have academic connections to the University, including Sir Matthew Pinsent, a four-time rowing gold medalist. T. E. Lawrence (better known as Lawrence of Arabia, military man, archaeologist and British writer) was a student at Jesus College. Other notable students include explorer, courtier and man of letters Sir Walter Raleigh and Australian media magnate Rupert Murdoch.

The long list of writers associated with the University includes Owen Barfield, John Fowles, Theodor Geisel, Thomas Middleton, Samuel Johnson, Robert Graves, Mary Renault, Evelyn Waugh, Lewis Carroll, Aldous Huxley, Oscar Wilde, C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien (writer of The Lord of the Rings), Graham Greene, V.S.Naipaul, Phillip Pullman, Joseph Heller, Vikram Seth, the Anglo-Saxon poets Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Donne, A. E. Housman, W. H. Auden, T. S. Eliot, Wendy Perriam, and Philip Larkin, and seven poet laureates (Thomas Warton, Henry James Pye, Robert Southey, Robert Bridges, Cecil Day- Lewis, Sir John Betjeman, and Andrew Motion).

Economists Adam Smith, Alfred Marshall, E. F. Schumacher and Amartya Sen, and philosophers John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Jeremy Bentham and Isaiah Berlin, enjoyed many of their days in Oxford, as did many scientific pioneers such as Albert Einstein and Erwin Schrödinger. Some pioneers of the Scientific Revolution, such as Robert Hooke and Robert Boyle, studied at or are associated with the University. Some linguists, such as Ghil'ad Zuckermann, studied at the University.

Some contemporary scientists also studied at the University including Silvia Maureen Williams, Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, Nobel Prize winner in Physics Anthony James Leggett, Tim Berners-Lee (co-inventor of the World Wide Web), and chemist Dorothy Hodgkin.

Composers Hubert Parry, George Butterworth, John Taverner, William Walton, and Andrew Lloyd-Webber have all been involved with the University.

Actors and actresses Hugh Grant, Kate Beckinsale, Dudley Moore, Michael Palin, Emma Watson and Terry Jones were once students at Oxford, as were Oscar winner Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck and the filmmakers Ken Loach and Richard Curtis.

The Other Oxford Students

There is a second university in Oxford, Oxford Brookes University (1), known as Oxford Polytechnic. Its campuses are located mostly in the eastern neighborhoods of the city. Its school of architecture is among the best in the world. There are also a number of independent 'colleges' that operate independently but under the name of the University of Oxford. Each has its own history, longevity and traditions.

Oxford in Literature and the Media

The novel Todas las almas, by the Spanish writer Javier Marías, tells the story of a young Spanish professor who teaches translation at the Tylor Institution in Oxford and who maintains almost sporadic relations with Clare Bayes, a married woman. It is an autobiographical novel, where the fiction is the least part of the true story of the author, Javier Marías, when he taught Spanish literature classes at Tylor in Oxford, in the mid-80s.

In the words of Marías, the fact that the protagonist of the novel taught for two years at Tylor was a literary loan. «Little of what is told in the book coincides with what I lived or learned in Oxford, or only the most accessory and that does not affect the facts: the muffled atmosphere of the reserved or elusive city and its timeless teachers […], the dark and meticulous old-fashioned bookstores…”, Marías said years later in Black Back of Time.