Columbia University, officially known as Columbia University in the City of New York, is a private institution of higher education. It is one of the world's foremost research universities, and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1754 under a royal charter granted by England's King George II, Columbia has grown over time to comprise 20 schools and affiliated institutions.
Columbia's main campus occupies six blocks in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of Manhattan, and its largest satellite campus, Health Sciences, is situated some fifty blocks uptown in the island's Washington Heights. This makes Columbia not only New York City's only Ivy League school but also, by some accounts, the city's second largest landowner after the Catholic Church. |
