Why do americans say 'college' when they typically mean 'university'?
Question:
Answer:
To understand this phenomenon, one must get that in the U.S., not all colleges are universities. The term college is a rather generic term that can be applied to accredited institutions and non-accredited alike; it can be applied to four-year and two-year undergraduate institutions, as well as professional graduate and post-graduate programs; I have even seen it applied to trade schools and schools that require no previous diploma for admission. Do a web search on the term "college" and you will see a host of prestigious and infamous organizations emerge.
Universities, on the other hand, are a collection of undergraduate and graduate schools or colleges. They tend to be accredited. The also tend to have research capabilities, grant doctoral degrees in various programs, have active alumni programs, sponsor intercollegiate sports teams, and attract and manage endowments.
Universities are treated as something of a subset of colleges (and tend to be more well-regarded for many purposes).
Yes. U.S. Americans use the words interchangeably. You won't hear U.S. Americans say "going to university". We say college to indicate a 4 year school that awards B.A./B.S. and higher degrees, and community college or junior college (older) to mean a 2 year school that awards A.A./A.S. degrees.
As an American, it sounds very funny to say "Im going to university"- Ive actually never heard another American say this, although I have heard people from Europe say this- Im not sure how it originated since usually (but definately not always) universities are of a higher status
An example in the State of massachusetts where a college is more prestegious than a university is that Boston College is certainly more prestigious than University of Massachusetts
It is somewhat based in American Slang that any educational institution, including some technical trade schools are all called college. The definition that I learned as a youngster was that a College was one School and that a University was a collection of different Colleges on the same Campus. Therefore as you say a more rounded education can come from a University, however if you go to the right College for your studies that would work as well if that was what you wanted. Also you would be more likely to hear someone say "I'm going to college" or "I'm off to college", but rarely would you hear someone say "I'm going off to college". Which is why I have always said the in the U.S. we speak American and always tried to get my high school councilers to consider the English I was required to take also to be my foreign languge. Oh Well I Tried!!
For the same reason that we say Ivy League College.
Canadians are not the only ones to say "I'm going to university". The rest of the English speaking world and most of the 'kind-of English speaking world' (except the Phillipines, which has even considered becoming part of the US) differentiates the different forms of tertiary education. We also only use 'school' to refer to primary or secondary institutions.
More accurately, in Australia we would say:
"I'm going to uni." = "I'm going on campus"
"I'm going to uni next year." = "I'm going to college next year"
"I'm a uni student" = "I'm a college student"
Students at the "University of Sydney" also call it "Sydney Uni" or "USyd".
If "University of New South Wales" students are present, we call "USyd" "The GOOD Uni" :)
The answer in there that is correct is that the College is with the University. For instance, my university had a Coleege of Liberal Arts, College of Pharmacy, College of Education, etc. that were all under the umbrella of the University. The distinction in the naming of American schools is the number of colleges that a campus has. Many smaller schools will only have a Liberal Arts College. I don't know what the tipping point is, but you have to have a certain number of colleges in order to be considered a university. Like so many other things, we Americans just bastardize the words to make them fit our needs...but that is what language is all about. Not saying it is a bad thing.
coz they like to be different
Americans do stuff like that because colleges and universities are very alike, along with other couples of words
In the United States, most bachelor degree-granting, prestigious institutions are actually called colleges. The word college is held in no less high regard here than the word university. For instance, Pomona College is one of the best colleges/universities in the country.
As for why there are many places called colleges instead of universities, it all goes back to Harvard, our first college. The founders of the school, having graduated from places like Oxford, were aware that they were not founding a university, but expected many other colleges to be founded around them, which would eventually join to become a university. This never happened, and they began issuing degrees, and many other colleges formed, modeled after Harvard, and so they called themselves colleges as well.
More Questions & Answers...