"Harvard College is a personal Ivy League research study college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with regarding 6,800 undergraduate students as well as regarding 14,000 postgraduate students. Developed in 1636 and called for its initial benefactor, clergyman John Harvard, Harvard is the United States' earliest organization of greater understanding and also among one of the most distinguished worldwide.

The Massachusetts Great and General Court licensed Harvard's founding. In its early years, Harvard College largely trained Congregational and also Unitarian clergy, although it has actually never ever been formally connected with any denomination. Its educational program and also trainee body were gradually secularized throughout the 18th century, as well as by the 19th century, Harvard had actually emerged as the main cultural facility among Boston elites. [9] [10] Complying With the American Civil War, President Charles W. Eliot's lengthy period (1869-- 1909) changed the college as well as affiliated professional colleges right into a modern study university; Harvard was an establishing participant of the Association of American Colleges in 1900. A. Lawrence Lowell, that did well Eliot, more changed the undergraduate educational program as well as embarked on hostile growth of Harvard's land holdings and physical school. James Bryant Conant led the college with the Great Clinical Depression and also World War II; he started to liberalize admissions after the war.

The college is composed of eleven primary academic systems-- 10 professors and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Research-- with schools throughout Greater Boston: its 209-acre (85 ha) initial undergraduate university is fixated Harvard Yard in Cambridge, 3 miles (5 km) northwest of Boston; business institution as well as lots of athletics centers, consisting of Harvard Arena, are across the Charles River in the Allston community of Boston; and also the medical, dental, and public health colleges remain in Boston's Longwood Medical Location. Harvard's endowment is valued at $40.9 billion, making it the largest of any academic organization. While the nominal expense of presence is high, the college's endowment allows it to supply generous, no-loan financial assistance bundles and also use need-blind admission. The Harvard Collection is the globe's largest scholastic collection system, comprising 79 specific collections holding concerning 20.4 million things.

Harvard's graduates consist of 8 U.S. presidents, more than 30 international presidents, 188 living billionaires, 369 Rhodes Scholars, and also 252 Marshall Scholars. Since March 2020, 160 Nobel laureates, 18 Fields Medalists, as well as 14 Turing Honor victors have actually been associated as students, professors, or researchers. On top of that, Harvard pupils and graduates have actually won 10 Academy Awards, 48 Pulitzer Prizes, as well as 108 Olympic medals (46 gold, 41 silver, and 21 bronze), and also founded many notable business worldwide."