University of Sydney - Campus

Main campus

 The cloisters in the Main Quadrangle


The main campus is spread across two inner-city suburbs of Sydney: Camperdown and Darlington.

Originally housed in what is now Sydney Grammar School, in 1855 the government granted the university land in Grose Farm, three kilometres from the city, which is now the main Camperdown campus. The architect Edmund Blacket designed the original Neogothic sandstone Quadrangle and Great Tower buildings, which were completed in 1862. The rapid expansion of the university in the mid-20th century resulted in the acquisition of land in Darlington across City Road. The Camperdown/Darlington campus houses the university's administrative headquarters, and the Faculties of Arts, Science, Education and Social Work, Pharmacy, Veterinary Science, Economics and Business, Architecture, and Engineering. It is also the home base of the large Faculty of Medicine, which has numerous affiliated teaching hospitals across the state.

The main campus is also the focus of the university's student life, with the student-run University of Sydney Union (known as 'the Union') in possession of three buildings – Wentworth, Manning and Holme Buildings. These buildings house a large proportion of the university's catering outlets, and provide space for recreational rooms, bars and function centres. One of the largest activities organised by the Union is the Orientation Week (or 'O-week'), centring on stalls set up by clubs and societies on the Front Lawns.

The main campus has been ranked among the top 10 of the world's most beautiful universities by the British Daily Telegraph.

The university is currently undertaking a large capital works program with the aim of revitalising the campus and providing more office, teaching and student space.

The program will see the amalgamation of the smaller science and technical libraries into a larger library, and the construction of a central administration and student services building along City Road. A new building for the School of Information Technologies opened in late 2006 and has been located on a site adjacent to the Seymour Centre. The busy Eastern Avenue thoroughfare has been transformed into a pedestrian plaza and a new footbridge has been built over City Road. The new home for the Sydney Law School, located alongside Fisher Library on the site of the old Edgeworth David and Stephen Roberts buildings, has been completed.

Continue reading →

University of Sydney - University rankings

QS World University Rankings 2012–2013 placed the University of Sydney 39th in the world.

The 2013 QS World University Rankings by Subject[22] placed Sydney in the top 20 in the world in 11 subjects; more than a third of the 30 measured. The University of Sydney was ranked 8th in the world for Education, 9th in Accounting and Finance and 10th in Law. Additionally, Sydney was placed 12th in English Language and Literature, History and Archaeology, Linguistics and Civil Engineering and Structural Engineering, the highest in Australia of those subjects. Psychology at Sydney was ranked 14th, Pharmacy and Pharmacology, and Communication and Media were ranked 16th, and the Sydney Medical School was ranked 17th.
The Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2011–2012 placed the University of Sydney 58th in the world.
     

On the Shanghai Jiaotong University's Academic Ranking of World Universities rankings in 2010, University of Sydney is placed 92nd in the world and 9th in the Asia Pacific.

Continue reading →

University of Sydney - History

In 1848, in the New South Wales Legislative Council, William Wentworth proposed a plan to expand the existing Sydney College into a larger university. Wentworth argued that a state university was imperative for the growth of a society aspiring towards self-government, and that it would provide the opportunity for "the child of every class, to become great and useful in the destinies of his country". It would take two attempts on Wentworth's behalf, however, before the plan was finally adopted.

The university was established via the passage of the University of Sydney Act, on 24 September 1850 and was assented on 1 October 1850 by Sir Charles Fitzroy. Two years later, the university was inaugurated on 11 October 1852 in the Big Schoolroom of what is now Sydney Grammar School. The first principal was John Woolley. On 27 February 1858 the university received its Royal Charter from Queen Victoria, giving degrees conferred by the university rank and recognition equal to those given by universities in the United Kingdom By 1859, the university had moved to its current site in the Sydney suburb of Camperdown.
 The Sydney University Regiment forming a guard of honour for the visiting Duke of York, 1927
In 1858, the passage of the Electoral Act provided for the university to become a constituency for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as soon as there were 100 graduates with higher degrees. This seat in the Parliament of New South Wales was first filled in 1876, but was abolished in 1880 one year after its second member, Edmund Barton, was elected to the Legislative Assembly.
Most of the estate of John Henry Challis was bequeathed to the university, which received a sum of £200,000 in 1889. This was thanks in part due to William Montagu Manning (Chancellor 1878–1895) who argued against the claims by British Tax Commissioners. The following year seven professorships were created: anatomy; zoology; engineering; history; law; logic and mental philosophy; and modern literature.

Continue reading →

University of Sydney

The University of Sydney is a public Australian university in Sydney, New South Wales. The main campus spreads across the suburbs of Camperdown and Darlington on the southwestern outskirts of the Sydney CBD. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and Oceania. In 2011 it had 32,393 undergraduate and 16,627 graduate students.[2]

The University of Sydney is organised into sixteen faculties and schools, through which it offers bachelor's degrees, master's degrees and doctoral degrees. Three Nobel laureates have been affiliated with the university as graduates and faculty.

Sydney consistently ranks amongst the top universities in Australia, Oceania and the world. In 2012, it was ranked 39th and in the top 0.3% in the 2012 QS World University Rankings.[3]

The University of Sydney is a member of Australia's Group of Eight, Academic Consortium 21, the Association of Pacific Rim Universities (APRU) and the Worldwide Universities Network. The university is also colloquially known as one of Australia's sandstone universities.

Continue reading →