Everything about The University Of Toronto totally explained
The
University of Toronto (
U of T) is a
public research university in the city of
Toronto,
Ontario,
Canada. It is the largest university in Canada in terms of student enrollment. The institution comprises sixteen academic faculties and a
collegiate framework of eleven colleges within its principal campus
St. George, which surrounds
Queen's Park in the
Downtown district. It is one of the most widely known and highly regarded universities in Canada and ranks highly in numerous world rankings. There are two other campuses along with the St. George campus in downtown Toronto—
University of Toronto Scarborough and
University of Toronto Mississauga.
The University was chartered in 1827 as
King's College, the first institution of higher learning in the colony of
Upper Canada. At first controlled by members of the
Church of England and the colonial establishment, the university acquired its present name in 1850 upon becoming a secular institution. Since the creation of
University College in 1853 as the first of its constituent colleges, the university had also incorporated the ecclesiastical schools of
Trinity College,
Victoria University and
St. Michael's College among others into its organization.
Research at the University of Toronto has been responsible for the world's first electronic heart
pacemaker, artificial larynx, single-lung transplant, nerve transplant, artificial pancreas,
chemical laser,
G-suit, the first practical
electron microscope, the first cloning of
T-cells, and the extraction of
insulin.
The university is consistently placed among the leading academic institutions of the world.
Newsweek magazine places the university first in Canada, and 18th worldwide, 9th among public universities, and among the top 5 universities outside the United States. The University is also affiliated with 9 Nobel laureates (6 alumni), the most of any Canadian university.
History
The founding of a colonial college had long been the desire of
John Graves Simcoe, the first
Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada. An
Oxford-educated military commander who fought in the
American Revolutionary War, Simcoe felt that a college would be needed to counter the spread of
republicanism from the
United States. In 1796, he told the Anglican
Bishop of Quebec in writing, "I have no idea that a University will be established, though I'm daily confirmed in its necessity." The Upper Canada Executive Committee recommended in 1798 that a university be established in the town of
York. On
March 15,
1827, King's College was established by a
Royal Charter from
King George IV, largely due to the efforts of
John Strachan, the influential
Anglican Bishop of Toronto who became the college's first president. The original three storey
Greek Revival building was constructed on the present site of the
Ontario Parliament Buildings. Under Strachan's guidance, King's College was a strongly Anglican institution closely aligned with the
Church of England and the
British colonial elite known as the
Family Compact.
After a lengthy and heated public debate, the newly-elected
responsible government of Upper Canada passed a law in 1849 to
secularize King's College. On
January 1,
1850, King's College was renamed as the
University of Toronto, officially severing its connection with the Anglican Church. A reorganization in 1853 created
University College as its nondenominational teaching branch. Enraged by the decision to secularize, Strachan left the presidency to open
Trinity College, a private Anglican college. Meanwhile, the university moved into a new home, the
Gothic Revival University College building on the present campus. Part of the old King's College property was leased to the province, forming
Queen's Park. During the
American Civil War,
British North America became threatened by the
Union blockade and the possibility of British intervention, prompting the creation of the University Rifle Corps. In 1866, the corps fought a battle to resist the
Fenian raids on the Niagara border.
The old King's College building was vacated and moved to
Parliament Buildings of Upper Canada after 1850 and thereafter
University College in 1857. The building later became Moss Hall,
The University Lunatic Asylum and finally by
Jarvis Collegiate Institute from 1870-1871. The building was finally demolished when the
Ontario Legislature was completed in 1893.
The School of Practical Science, precursor to the modern
Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, was established in 1878 to offer instruction in engineering, mining, mechanics and manufacturing. The first engineering building was known as the "Little Red Skulehouse", and thereafter the faculty came to be nicknamed
Skule. The
University of Toronto Faculty of Medicine, first opened in 1843, resumed teaching in 1887. The medical teaching branch had been closed for 34 years after the reorganization of 1853, although the university continued to set examinations and award medical degrees during that period. The
University of Toronto Faculty of Law also opened in 1887. The
Faculty of Dentistry was founded as the
Royal College of Dental Surgeons in 1875 and affiliated with the university in 1888. Women were admitted for the first time in 1884.
Towards the end of the 19th century, several ecclesiastical colleges began considering various forms of union with the University of Toronto to ensure their long-term viability.
Knox College, a
Presbyterian institution, and
Wycliffe College, a
low church seminary, encouraged their students to study for non-divinity degrees at University College and in 1885 entered a formal affiliation with the university. In 1890, they further elected to become
federated schools of the University of Toronto, thereby giving up the right to confer all save theology and divinity degrees. The idea of federation met strong opposition at
Victoria University, a
Methodist school in the town of
Cobourg. Having rejected the first proposal, a financial incentive finally convinced Victoria's senate and board of regents to accept federation in 1890. Decades after the death of John Strachan, the
University of Trinity College was brought under the federation of the University of Toronto in 1904. It was followed in 1910 by the
University of St. Michael's College, a
Roman Catholic college first founded by the
Basilian Fathers. Among the institutions that had seriously considered federation but ultimately remained independent were
McMaster University, a
Baptist school that moved to
Hamilton, and Queen's College, a Presbyterian school in
Kingston that later became
Queen's University.
A devastating fire in 1890 severely damaged the interior of University College and devoured thirty-three thousand volumes from the library. The board of trustees commissioned a swift restoration of the building, and within two years the library was replenished with forty thousand new volumes. In 1896, the
Royal Conservatory of Music became an affiliated institution of the university. Founded in 1901, the
University of Toronto Press was at first responsible for printing university documents and examination papers, and began publishing books in 1912. The
University of Toronto Schools, an
independent secondary school, was established in 1910 by the Faculty of Education to conduct its training. The
Royal Ontario Museum, the country's largest and preeminent museum, was administered by the university from its creation in 1912 until 1968, when it retained the close ties as an independent body.
The
David Dunlap Observatory in
Richmond Hill opened in midst of the
Great Depression, and expansion continued to be slow during the
Second World War. A new centre for advanced research, the
University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies, was established in 1949. The following year, the university opened the Institute of Business Administration, now the
Rotman School of Management.
New College, established in 1962, departed from the prevalent practice at the older colleges by drawing a sizable portion of its students from multiple faculties. In 1963,
Massey College was founded as an exclusive residence for graduate students. Originally conceived as an extension to New College,
Innis College was created as a separate constituent college in 1964. The university opened branch campuses in
Scarborough in 1964 and in
Mississauga in 1967. First organized in 1959 as a subsidiary,
York University became fully independent in 1965.
Woodsworth College opened in 1974 to serve students of part-time studies. Beginning in the 1980s, reductions in government funding prompted the university to intensify its fundraising efforts. The University of Toronto was the first Canadian university to amass a
financial endowment greater than C$1 billion.
St. George Campus
The main campus of the University of Toronto is situated about a mile north of the financial district in
Downtown Toronto and immediately south of the affluent neighbourhoods
Yorkville and
The Annex. It encompasses 68 hectares (168 acres) in a block bounded by
Bay Street,
Bloor Street,
Spadina Avenue and
College Street. An enclave surrounded by university grounds,
Queen's Park is the site of the
Ontario Legislature and several historic monuments. Together, the park and the university comprise a distinct area of forested parkland and interlocking courtyards in the downtown region. Named for the university,
University Avenue is a ceremonial
boulevard and arterial thoroughfare that runs through downtown between Queen's Park and
Front Street. The campus is served by
TTC buses,
streetcars. Subway stations located adjacent or in the campus are
Spadina Station,
St. George Station,
Museum Station, and
Queen's Park Station.
The architecture is defined by a combination of
Romanesque and
Gothic Revival buildings spread across the eastern and central sections, most of them dated between 1858 and 1929. The traditional heart of the university lies in the grounds of King's College Circle, enclosing an oval lawn known as Front Campus. The centrepiece is the main building of
University College, a
National Historic Site, designed by
Frederick William Cumberland in an eclectic blend of Romanesque and
Norman architectural styles.
Convocation Hall, built in 1907 with a gift from the alumni association, is recognizable for its domed roof and
Ionic pillared rotunda. Although its foremost function is to host the annual graduation ceremonies, the building serves as a venue for academic and social events throughout the year. The sandstone buildings of
Knox College epitomizes the North American collegiate Gothic style with the characteristic cloisters around a secluded courtyard.
The northeastern part of Front Campus leads into a green space anchored by
Hart House, a multi-purpose student centre. Hart House is named for
Hart Massey, whose
Massey Foundation financed the construction of the Late Gothic complex between 1911 and 1919. Among its assorted common rooms, the Great Hall is the most architecturally renowned, featuring high timbered ceilings and stained glass windows. West of Hart House, Soldiers' Tower stands tall and is the most prominent structure in the vicinity. The stone arches at the tower's base are inscribed with the names of university members killed in the battlefields of the world wars. The tower features a 51-bell
carillon that's played on special occasions such as
Remembrance Day and convocation.
The oldest surviving building on campus is the
Louis Beaufort Stewart Observatory building, now home to the students' union. Built in 1855, the magnetic observatory operated until the turn of the 20th century, when air pollution and urban electrification rendered it obsolete. In 1908, the building was moved to its present site near Hart House. Another scientific institution, the McLennan Laboratories, was housed in the
Edwardian-style Sandford Fleming Building now occupied by the engineering faculty.
The grounds of
Trinity College borders the Back Campus lawn north of University College. The Trinity main building was designed in the
Jacobethan Tudor style, while its newer chapel, designed by English architect
Giles Gilbert Scott, was based on a modified Gothic style. To the east, the
University of Toronto Faculty of Law occupies two estates converted from heritage mansions: the smaller Falconer Hall contains the faculty offices, while Flavelle House contains a restored solarium and a modern expansion containing the law library. The
Victoria College property is located across from Queen's Park, with its intricate main building built from red sandstone and grey limestone.
Developed after the
Second World War, the western section of the campus between St. George Street and Spadina Avenue consist mainly of
modernist and
internationalist structures. Notable post-war buildings include the Lash Miller Chemical Laboratories, Wetmore Hall and Wilson Hall of
New College, and Sidney Smith Hall. The most significant example of
Brutalist architecture is the
Robarts Library complex, a large fourteen-storey concrete structure built in 1972. Newer buildings completed after 2001 include the Bahen Centre for Information Technology, the Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research, and the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy Building designed by
Norman Foster.
Apart from the main campus, the university also maintains institutions and facilities in other locations. The
David Dunlap Observatory is located on a 77-hectare (190 acres) property in
Richmond Hill, Ontario. The main observatory building possesses the largest
optical telescope in Canada. The
University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies in northern Toronto is a specialized research facility and graduate school operated by the
Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. The
Koffler Scientific Reserve in
King Township comprises 346 hectares (855 acres) of wetlands and forests in the ecologically sensitive
Oak Ridges Moraine.
Governance
The University of Toronto has traditionally been a decentralized institution, with governing authority shared among the central administration, academic faculties, colleges and campuses. The campuses operate autonomously within a
federal body that confers degrees. At the main campus, colleges retain much self-governance under a
collegiate university model. The
Royal Charter of 1827 provided the original basis for the university's administration; it was amended in 1849 for the secularization of King's College. The charter was largely superseded in 1853 by the
University of Toronto Act, which was since amended in 1873, 1887, 1901, 1906 and 1971.
The Governing Council is the
unicameral legislative organ of the central administration, overseeing general academic, business and institutional affairs. The council consists of 50 members, among which 16 are appointed by the provincial government at the direction of the
Premier of Ontario. The remaining members include faculty members, administrative staff, current students, alumni and appointees of the President. Before the amendment of 1971, the University of Toronto was governed under a
bicameral system like most North American universities, composed of the board of governors and the university senate.
The Chancellor serves as the ceremonial head of the university. Typically filled by a former
lieutenant governor, premier or diplomat, the office is elected by alumni for a renewable term of three years. The President is appointed by the council to serve as the university's chief executive. The President directs university-wide policies and plans, appoints academic officers and grants tenure to professors. The Chancellor and the President are both
ex-officio members of the council. Simcoe Hall, located on the grounds of Front Campus, houses the bulk of the central administration including the offices of the President and the Governing Council. The university also maintains an
official residence for the President in the neighbourhood of
Rosedale.
Colleges
The
collegiate system of the University of Toronto comprises four constituent colleges, three federated universities, four theological colleges and an affiliated college. Every arts and science undergraduate on the St. George Campus is a member of one of the seven arts and science colleges. The
Faculty of Arts and Science administers almost all courses, allowing students to enroll in classes independent of their college. The college registrars and counsellors are responsible for assisting students with applications and course-related queries. However, first-year seminars and academic programs are offered by all colleges.
Each college has at least one student residence; some are
co-ed, others are single-sex. The University of Toronto offers a housing guarantee to all full-time undergraduates entering first year who expressed an interest in residing on-campus during the application process. Notably, U of T successfully upheld this guarantee during the Ontario
double cohort of 2003.
The colleges differ in character, history, and resources, and each college houses specific academic programs, which serve to attract students.
The University of Trinity College is home to the
Munk Centre for International Studies, University College is home to the
Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies and the
Centre for Sexual Diversity, Victoria College is home to the
Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, Innis College houses the university's film program, New College is home to the
Women's and Gender Studies Institute and Equity Studies program, while the
Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies is associated with St. Michael's.
In addition to the arts and sciences colleges, there are also four theological colleges and a graduate college affiliated with the university. The theological colleges form part of the
Toronto School of Theology.
Knowledge Media Design Institute (KMDI) is the University of Toronto's first
virtual institute.
Academics
Faculties and programs
Each of the university's sixteen faculties and schools governs its own admission process and academic programs. The
Faculty of Arts and Science and the
Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering permit entry into
bachelor degree programs. The other
undergraduate schools, composed of the Faculty of Music, the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing, the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy and the Faculty of Physical Education, admit only from those already in undergraduate studies. A majority of undergraduate students are enrolled in the Faculty of Arts and Science, which houses 29 departments and more than 300 undergraduate programs.
Graduate programs in the arts and sciences are offered by the School of Graduate Studies. The
Faculty of Medicine has eleven teaching and research hospitals, most notably the
University Health Network, the
Hospital for Sick Children and the
Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. The university's
teachers college is the
Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, which is affiliated with its prestigious
laboratory school, the
University of Toronto Schools. There are eight other faculties and professional schools that confer graduate degrees: the
Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design, the
Faculty of Dentistry, the Faculty of Forestry, the
Faculty of Information Studies, the
Faculty of Law, the Faculty of Social Work, the
Rotman School of Management and the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy. Non-degree courses are provided separately through the School of Continuing Studies.
In addition to subsidiary departments and centres that are governed and funded by its faculties, the University of Toronto is the host of several independent institutes. The
Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics is supported by the
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council for studies in theoretical astronomy and related subjects. The
Fields Institute is a centre for research and international collaboration in mathematical sciences. The university is also home to one of the worldwide locations of
Newman Centres.
Library
The University of Toronto library system is Canada's largest academic library and is the third-largest in North America, after Harvard, and Yale. As of April, 2006, it held 10.5 million bookform items, 5.4 million microform items, and 1.9 million other items in its collections.
The fourteen-storey
Robarts Library is the main
humanities and
social sciences library, and the largest book repository in Canada. The
architecture was inspired by the silhouette of a
peacock. It also houses the
Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library. The
Gerstein Science Information Centre is the flagship library supporting the sciences and health sciences.
The university has been working with the
Internet Archive to digitize many of its collections for an online library. It is also a founding member of the
Open Content Alliance, joined by
Yahoo and the
University of California.
Ranking and reputation
The University of Toronto ranks first in Canada and 23rd worldwide in the 2007 edition of the
Academic Ranking of World Universities by
Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
The Times Higher Education Supplement places the university second in Canada and 27th in the world overall, 20th in Science, 18th in Biomedicine, 11th in Arts & Humanities, 17th in Social Sciences and 11th in Technology.
Newsweek places the university first in Canada, and 18th worldwide, 9th among
public universities, and among the top 5 universities outside the United States. In addition, the University of Toronto placed 28th in the world, 1st in Canada, in the
Webometrics Ranking of World Universities as of July 2007.
In the
THES - QS World University Rankings 2007, Toronto was ranked third in Canada and 45th in the world, behind
McGill University (12th) and
University of British Columbia (33rd).
For twelve consecutive years beginning from 1994, U of T was ranked by
Maclean's magazine as the top Medical-Doctoral university in Canada. In 2005, it tied for first place with
McGill University. In 2006, U of T and many other universities refused to provide
Maclean's with data due to concerns regarding the magazine's ranking methodology. In that year, U of T was ranked 3rd in the Medical-Doctoral category, behind
McGill University (1st) and
Queen's University (2nd). In 2007, U of T was ranked 4th in the Medical-Doctoral category, behind McGill (1st), Queens (tied 2nd), and UBC (tied 2nd).
The Scientist rated U of T as the best place to work in academia outside the United States. Research InfoSource ranks U of T among the top research universities in Canada. The Association of Research Libraries rated the university's library as the third-best research library in North America, following
Harvard University and
Yale University. For several years, the university has also been ranked as one of
Canada's Top 100 Employers, as published in
Maclean's magazine.
Student life
There are 380 student clubs and organizations associated with the University of Toronto.
Full-time undergraduate student government is headed by the
University of Toronto Students' Union, formerly known as the Students' Administrative Council. Graduate students are represented by the Graduate Students' Union, the largest union of its kind in Canada, and part-time undergraduates are represented by the Association for Part-time Undergraduate Students. All three student associations are member locals of the
Canadian Federation of Students and these student constituencies are represented on the Governing Council of the university.
The university is represented in
Canadian Interuniversity Sport by the
Toronto Varsity Blues. There are six main sports funded by the university: hockey, football, basketball, track and field, soccer, and swimming. The numerous other sports are funded through donations and fees paid by those participating.
The school has two main newspapers.
The Varsity and
The Newspaper. Each college, faculty, and many other groups also publish newspapers.
CIUT is the campus' radio station.
The
Hart House Review (HHR) is a Canadian literary magazine / literary journal which publishes a number of the university's bright and eclectic voices in poetry, fiction and art.
Student activism
The University has borne witness to much activism over the years. In 1895, University College students, allegedly led by
William Lyon Mackenzie King, boycotted classes for a week after the editor of the Varsity student newspaper was suspended for anti-administration articles. Although King is traditionally given credit for leadership of the strike, recent scholarship has suggested that his involvement has been overstated.
The 1960s saw the creation of
Rochdale College, a large high-rise residence where many students and staff lived. It wasn't officially connected to the university. Rochdale was established as an alternative to what had been seen as the traditional, authoritarian, and paternalistic structures within universities. The college eventually became a haven for local drug culture, partially because the student organisers contracted a biker gang to provide security. Due to violent clashes with police, political pressure forced the college to close in 1975.
In the fall of 1969, after
Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau decriminalized homosexuality, the University of Toronto Homophile Association, the first
gay and
lesbian group in Toronto or on any Canadian university campus, was formed. Jearld Moldenhauer, a research assistant at the Faculty of Medicine, placed an advertisement in
The Varsity, asking others to join in setting up an organization. While the first meeting drew a meager 16 people — 15 men and one woman — the group quickly established a significant profile within the community and the city at large. Two decades later, David Rayside, a professor of political science, would organize the Committee on Homophobia. Ten years after that, he'd help introduce a sexual diversity studies program at
University College, to much success. 35 years after the start of
LGBT activism at U of T, the student
queer community is represented by the Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Trans People of the University of Toronto (LGBTOUT).
On
February 7,
2007, a number of students from all three campuses, joined by many students from across Ontario, staged one of the largest student protests in Canadian history. The student mass, which numbered in the thousands, demanded the
provincial government to lower tuition fees. One month later, on
March 8, a smaller number of students held another protest on the same issue. This protest, known as the ‘Student Day of Anger’ consisted of a group of students making loud noises outside the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities to mark the one year anniversary of the lift on the tuition fee freeze.
Student groups
U of T has numerous prominent students groups. One of the most notable is the
Hart House Debating Club, home to one of the top-ranked debating teams in the world, and champions at the 1981 and 2006
World Universities Debating Championships.
The United Nations Society has also gained tremendous achievements in the past year with best delegate awards at prestigious
Model UN conferences in North America including
McMUN, the
Harvard National Model United Nations and the
Canadian International Model United Nations in the year 2007-2008.
The University of Toronto
Formula SAE Racing Team has also received accolades recently, taking the Formula Student European Championships in 2003, 2005 and 2006 making them one of only five teams to have won three or more championships in this 300 team 26 year old series.
The University of Toronto is also home to many
Greek student organizations, such as the FSC (Fraternity
Sorority
Council), although none are officially sponsored by the school.
Student housing
Housing could be an issue for the downtown (St. George) campus. Residences are usually expensive, but most provide a meal plan. Many find it more suitable to share an apartment with a friend off campus. The University's Student Housing Service provides detailed information on various residences as well as housing ads for off-campus rental housing.
Student residence is available at the following places at the St. George Campus:
Alumni and faculty
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