Cambridge University

Cambridge is a university town; it is situated at a distance of 70 miles from London. Cambridge is one of the loveliest towns of England and a well-known University. Newton, Byron, Darwin, Rutherford and many other scientists and writers were educated at Cambridge. In Cambridge everything centres on the University and its colleges.

The oldest college is Peterhouse, which was founded in 1284. The most recent is Robinson College, which was opened in 1977. The most famous is probably King’s, because of its magnificent chapel. Its choir of boys and undergraduates is also very well known.

The University was exclusively for men until 1871 when the first women’s college was opened. Another was opened two years later and a third in 1954. In the 1970s, most colleges opened their doors to both men and women. Almost all colleges now are mixed, but it will be many years before there are equal numbers of both sexes. Until today there are more than twenty colleges in Cambridge.

There is a close connection between the University and colleges, though they are quite separate in theory and practice.

Each college has its own building, its own internal organization, its own staff and students. In order to enter the university, one must first apply to a college and become a member of the university through the college. The colleges are not connected with any particular study. Students studying literature, for example, and those trained for physics may belong to one and the same college.

However the fact is that one is to be a member of a college in order to be a member of the University. The colleges are governed by twenty or thirty “fellows”. Fellows of a college are “tutors” (teachers, often called “dons”). Each tutor has 10 – 12 students studying under his guidance. Tutors teach their own subject to those students in the college who are studying it, and they are responsible for their progress.

Every college is governed by a dean. Discipline is looked after by proctors’ and numerous minor officials called “bulldogs”.

The University is like a federation of colleges. It arranges the courses, the lectures and the examinations, and grants the degrees.

A college is a group of buildings forming a square with a green lawn in the centre. An old tradition does not allow the students to walk on the grass: this is the privilege of professors and head students only. Most of the colleges, however, allow visitors to enter the grounds and courtyards. The most popular place from which to view them is from the Backs, where the college grounds go down to the river Cam.

Students study at the University for four years, three terms a year. Long vacation lasts about three months. There are many libraries at Cambridge; some of them have rare collections of books. In one of them among the earliest books by Shakespeare and other great writes one may see an early description of Russia by an Englishman on diplomatic service there (in 1591) and a Russian reading book of the seventeenth century.

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