Ranked second among world universities by the Academic Ranking of World Universities and ranked fourth nationally according to the U.S. News & World Report, Stanford University features a renowned education that boasts some of the world's pre-eminent scholars and leaders, a distinguished arts programs and an athletic division that continues to flourish in the NCAA and Pac-10 Conference.
HISTORY
Back in 1891, railroad tycoon Leland Stanford and his wife, Jane Stanford, established the University to honor their only son, Leland Stanford, Jr., after he died in 1884. Formally named Leland Stanford Junior University, the institution is more commonly referred to as Stanford University. Sprawling over 8,100 acres, the University resides on the location of what used to be the Stanfords' horse farm, where the nickname "The Farm" still endures today. Dedicated to providing an education to all who wished to pursue it, tuition was absolutely free until the 1930s. Today, tuition without financial aid averages $37,380. Required fees are $501, and Room and Board costs $11,463. The motto of Stanford University, selected by President David Starr Jordan in the 1910s, is "Die Luft der Freiheit weht." The German quote from Ulrich von Hutten translates to, "The wind of freedom blows."
Stanford has seven schools: Humanities & Sciences, Engineering, Earth Sciences, Business, Education, Law and Medicine, of which the first three offer both undergraduate and graduate programs, and the last four offer just graduate programs.
With more than 650 student organizations from the Ramshead Theatrical Society to Japanese Taiko drumming to Students for a Sustainable Stanford, the University has a group for every student interest. The arts scene is pulsating with more than 1000 events each month.
Known for its athletic prowess, Stanford University has won the NACDA Director's Cup for the past 16 years, an award given to the top ranked collegiate athletic program. Stanford students compete in 35 varsity sports and 20 club sports and have won 99 National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) team titles (second behind UCLA) and 421 individual NCAA championships (the most of any school) since its inception.
On the second largest campus in the world (behind the University of Moscow), Stanford is one of the few universities that offers a guaranteed four years of on-campus housing to undergraduates, plus ample housing to graduate students. By housing the majority of its students on campus, students feel connected to the campus and spend the majority of their day—from attending class to mealtimes to the night scene—on campus.
Stanford also considers itself part of the international community and offers the Bing Overseas Program. It currently offers programs in eleven locations around the world: Australia, Beijing, Berlin, Cape Town, Florence, Kyoto, Madrid, Moscow, Oxford, Paris and Santiago.
Its notable alumni include celebrities, professional athletes, 16 Nobel Prize laureates and founders of companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Cisco Systems, Yahoo!, Google, Nike and Gap.
