Instruction conducted at colleges and universities

In the USA instruction is provided by the members of the faculty by the lecture method and informal discussions. The aim is to develop in students logical thinking, creativity, curiosity and imagination. Computers are being increasingly used everywhere: in libraries, laboratories for facilitating research and data processing. A distinctive feature of recent decades at American colleges and universities is the growing number of graduate students who are involved in research projects.

The official name of an institution does not necessarily indicate the level of teaching it provides. Some schools designated “universities” do not provide courses beyond those leading to the Bachelor's degree, while others called “colleges” offer programmes leading to the PhD and enjoy great prestige.

Universities and colleges in the USA differ greatly in the quality of teaching, enrollment and prestige. The largest campuses are the University of California (UC) with its nine campuses, the City University of New York (CUNY), Michigan State University and others. But there are universities to which the term “leading” may be applied. These are Chicago, Harvard, Illinois, MIT, Princeton, Stanford, Yale and some others. These universities are esteemed according to the amount of research done in them, which is to a great extent budgeted by the Federal Government. In recent decades federal money has become a major factor in the total performance of many universities. Such schools are usually referred to as research universities. It isconsidered very prestigious to go to Graduate School at such a university. Ranking just below the “leading” universities are universities where scientists and scholars of international renown are also to be found but not in such dense clusters as at Harvard, Berkeley or MIT. In the minor universities there is a limited number of able professors who can guide a graduate student in doing research for his thesis. This does not mean, however, that first-rate scientists are to be found only in the leading universities.

The American system of higher education consists actually of three stages: stage one – junior and community colleges with a two-year training, but this stage is usually bypassed; stage two – Liberal Arts Colleges and Undergraduate Schools of colleges and universities providing a four-year training and awarding the Bachelor's degree, and stage three – Graduate Schools of universities and colleges awarding the Master's degree and the PhD. That is where the researchers are trained.

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Harvard University

Founded in 1636, Harvard University is one of the oldest and most prestigious universities in the United States. From its classrooms have emerged six American presidents – from John Adams to John F. Kennedy – and an impressive group of statesmen, business leaders, and literary figures. Its campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts, just across the Charles River from Boston, provides a rich architectural mix that includes the ivy-covered brick of Puritan New England and the concrete and glass of contemporary design.

Today, the university includes Harvard and Radcliffe undergraduate colleges, 10 professional schools, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and an extension school. There are some 1,600 students from every state and 45 foreign countries in it; tuition is about $22,000 a year (not including room and board), and 70% of those attending receive financial aid in the form of load or outright grants.

The university's library system is the largest in the world; it contains more than 10 million volumes and subscribes to 100,000 periodicals. There are three notable art museums, which house works from ancient Egyptian to contemporary American. There are also the Botanical Museum, 40 acres of fields, an experimental forest located in New England, a centre for a study of the Italian Renaissance in Italy, and a centre for Byzantine studies in Washington, D. C.

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