Colleges & Universities

The San Francisco Bay Area is home to well-educated residents. Two-thirds of the Bay Area residents have education and training beyond high school, and well above 40 percent have graduated from college and beyond. A full 16 percent of city residents hold graduate degrees, topping the rankings of major cities in the United States. Globally recognized universities, colleges and professional schools offer stimulating environments at which to matriculate.

More than 35 colleges and universities comprise the Bay Area's world-class educational and research facilities. The National Research Council (NRC) rates the University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) and Stanford University as the two top-ranked graduate schools in the country. NRC also ranks programs in the biological and biomedical sciences at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) among the nation's best.

UCSF is one of the nation's top health, science and educational institutions and a world leader in advancing new techniques to diagnose and treat disease. UCSF's School of Medicine and School of Nursing maintain their high national rankings in the new annual survey of the best graduate schools published by US News & World Report. Both rank in the Top 10 in the nation.

The University of San Francisco has been part of the community since 1855, and today continues its mission of training young people for positions of leadership in the community.

San Francisco's newest addition is the Wharton School, an extension of the University of Pennsylvania. The school offer top-quality management education to the region's business leaders and organizations.

Allliant University continues to serve the area by providing educational programs in psychology. Four campuses throughout California have offered highly regarded programs for more than 25 years.

City College of San Francisco, a public, two-year community college, offers credit and non-credit classess to 80,000 full- and part-time students at eight campuses and additional outreach locations throughout the city.

San Francisco State University, which celebrated its centennial in 1999, has built a national reputation for addressing real-world issues through practical, applied research and scholarly work.

Golden Gate University, which traces its origins to the founding of the YMCA in 1853, is an independent, multi-campus university that offers certificate and degree programs throughout California, Nevada, Washington and abroad.

Founded in 1907, California College of the Arts is the largest regionally accredited, independent school of art and design in the Western United States.

Established in 1929, the Academy of Art College is now the largest fully accredited private school of art and design in the nation. Increasingly, academy students are winning national art competitions and are recruited by industry leaders nationwide.