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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 in 1209, some academics fled north-east to Cambridge where they established what became the University of Cambridge. The two English ancient universities share many common features and are jointly referred to as Oxbridge. Oxford is ranked among the most prestigious universities in the world.
The university is made up of thirty-nine semi-autonomous 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. All students are members of a college. It does not have a main campus, and 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 predominantly centrally.
Oxford operates the world's oldest university museum, as well as the largest university press in the world and the largest academic library system nationwide. In the fiscal year ending 31 July 2019, the university had a total income of £2.45 billion, of which £624.8 million was from research grants and contracts.
Oxford has educated a wide range of notable alumni, including 28 prime ministers of the United Kingdom and many heads of state and government around the world. As of October 2020, 72 Nobel Prize laureates, 3 Fields Medalists, and 6 Turing Award winners have studied, 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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Jesus College Boat Club, the rowing club for members of Jesus College, was formed in 1835. Rowing at the college predates the club's foundation, as a boat from Jesus was involved in the earliest recorded races between college crews at Oxford in 1815, when it competed against a crew from Brasenose College. In the early years of rowing at Oxford, Jesus was one of the few colleges that participated in races. A number of college members have rowed for Oxford against Cambridge in the Boat Race and the Women's Boat Race. Barney Williams, a Canadian rower who studied at the college, won a silver medal in rowing at the 2004 Summer Olympics, and participated in the Boat Race in 2005 and 2006. Other students who rowed while at the college have achieved success in other fields, including John Sankey, who became Lord Chancellor, and Alwyn Williams, who became Bishop of Durham. The college boathouse, which is shared with Keble College's boat club, dates from 1964 and replaced a moored barge used by spectators and crew-members. (Full article...)
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Wycliffe Hall is one of the Permanent Private Halls (PPHs) of the University of Oxford. Unlike the colleges, which are run by their Fellows, PPHs are run by an outside institution – in the case of Wycliffe Hall, the Church of England. Founded in 1877, it became a PPH in 1996. It provides theological training for candidates for ordained and lay ministry; it also admits other students to study theology. It is named after John Wycliffe, a 14th-century theologian, and its buildings are in North Oxford, on Banbury Road. It is rooted in the evangelical tradition of the Church of England, although it admits students from all Christian denominations. Its Victorian trust deed upholds the Thirty-Nine Articles, part of the English Reformation heritage of the Church of England, Since the 19th century the college has had close links with the Oxford Inter-Collegiate Christian Union and the Oxford Pastorate, two evangelical organisations working with Oxford students. Alumni include Donald Coggan (Archbishop of Canterbury), Tom Wright (Bishop of Durham), Nicky Gumbel (developer of the Alpha Course), and Wilbert Awdry (priest and creator of the Thomas the Tank stories). (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 Lord Nuffield rejected the first designs for the buildings of Nuffield College, Oxford (tower as later designed pictured) by the architect Austen Harrison, saying that they were "un-English"?
- ... that George West, the Lord Bishop of Rangoon 1935–54, became for two months the Bishop of Atlanta, Georgia, while the Japanese occupied Burma?
- ... that the financial endowment by Edmund Meyrick, a Welsh cleric and philanthropist who died in 1713, is still awarding scholarships to students at Jesus College three centuries later?
- ... that William Hayter was secretary of the UK delegation to the Potsdam Conference, later Ambassador to the Soviet Union, and then Warden of New College?
- ... that Lancelot Blackburne was thought to have spent time in the Caribbean as a buccaneer as a young man, and lived openly with his mistress whilst Archbishop of York?
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On this day
Events for 4 July relating to the university, its colleges, academics and alumni. College affiliations are marked in brackets.
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