Originally, a University was a research institution focusing on graduate studies, while a College was a teaching institution focused on undergraduates. However, because some colleges wanted the prestige they felt was associated with the idea of a university (and because a lot of Colleges started offering master’s degrees, although most of them were more professional and less research-oriented), many schools changed from calling themselves a college to calling themselves a university, so now the term is a little more vague than it used to be. Two-year schools, though, like community colleges, pretty much exclusively call themselves colleges.

There is also a little confusion in that often the individual units within a university are called “colleges”, as in the College of Fine Arts or the College of Business at XXX University.

College Vs University

A university is an umbrella organization that includes two or more colleges or schools. In some British universities, many of the various colleges that make up the university are semi-autonomous undergraduate colleges. But in the U.S., the typical configuration is an undergraduate college and a graduate school. The university may also have any number of professional schools such as a law school, a medical school, etc. Accordingly, universities typically (but not always) offer graduate programs whereas colleges are typically (but not always) undergraduate. Universities are for the same reasons typically (but not always) larger than colleges. Many smaller colleges push the definition of a university to claim a right to the title because they think it will aid them in marketing themselves. And a few colleges with long and distinguished histories (such as the College of William and Mary, Dartmouth College, Boston College) hang on to the term “college” for historical reasons although they are, in fact, major universities.

There isn’t that significant of a difference, and often the terms are used interchangeably in the US.

The most typical difference (but there are always exceptions) is that a college has more limited fields of study and don’t have graduate programs (you can only get a bachelor’s degree, no masters or doctorate). A university offers a wider variety of areas of study and they have graduate programs.

And just to confuse you some more, many universities have subsections called colleges. They don’t fit into the above mentioned “rules”, but they are a specific area of study such as a College of Nursing, or a College of Engineering. You apply to the university, and go to the university, but if you study engineering your classes are in the college of engineering and you may have to apply to that specific college for higher level classes such as senior level classes that are extremely specific to your area of study. Many universities do this for their nursing programs; Texas Women’s University for example. You apply to TWU, you go to TWU for your first two years taking pre-requisite courses and core classes, and then you apply to the College of Nursing for the “upper division” nursing classes (the actual nursing classes).

A university has a graduate school program or law school in addition to the undergraduate college. Universities are usually large enough that they have multiple colleges within, in addition to the graduate school. A college that exists on its own is usually much smaller than university.

A college rep who came to my senior English class said that it was the percentage of faculty that had a certain degree level. So if there were enough percentage of professors at a school that had- I don’t know if it’s masters or doctorate level degrees in what they teach- then that school would be able to be labeled a ‘university.’

universities offer masters and up, colleges just up to a 4 year degree.

same thing