![]() Campus from above
|
|
Motto |
Die Luft der Freiheit weht
|
---|---|
Type | Private |
Established | 1891 |
Endowment | $17.2 billion |
President | John L. Hennessy |
Administrative staff
|
1,771 |
Students | 14,945 |
Undergraduates | 6,759 |
Postgraduates | 8,186 |
Location | , , |
Campus | Suburban |
Athletics | NCAA Division I FBS |
Nickname | Cardinal |
Mascot | Cardinal |
Website | www.stanford.edu |
The Leland Stanford Junior University, often called Stanford University (or simply Stanford), is a private university next to Palo Alto in California, in the middle of Silicon Valley, about 37 miles (60 kilometers) southeast of San Francisco and about 20 miles northwest of San José, in Santa Clara County. Leland and Jane Stanford opened the university on 1 October 1891. They named the university after their son, Leland Stanford Junior, who died at young age.
With one of the largest university campuses in the United States, the University includes the Schools of Engineering, Law, Medicine, Education, Business, Earth Sciences, and Humanities and Sciences. Stanford also hosts volunteer programs and a teaching hospital.
Contents
History
Leland Stanford Junior died in Europe in 1884. His parents, Leland and Jane Stanford, were rich and influential Californians. They chose to turn a farm they already owned into a large university, as a memorial to their curious son. Stanford had early trouble, as the school ran low on money, and was hurt by the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake.
Herbert Hoover, who later became the US President, helped the school improve its operations, and later university leaders pushed students and alumni to develop the surrounding area. By the 1950's, cities around Stanford University were filling with technology companies, starting what became Silicon Valley.
Campus
Stanford has many special areas. In honor of Stanford graduate and US president Herbert Hoover, Stanford hosts a large think tank and archive called the Hoover Institution. Many former students, like the founders of HP, donate lots of money and have buildings named after them. A large radio telescope called "The Dish" sits on the hills above Stanford.
Student Body
Stanford has about 7,000 undergraduate students, and a larger number of students working on advanced degrees. Few high school students who apply to Stanford are accepted - over the last several years, only four out of every hundred students who applied were offered a spot.
People who worked at or graduated from Stanford University
People who graduated from Stanford University are:
- Nicolas Sadirac (1989), founder and current head of the École pour l'informatique et les nouvelles technologies
People who have worked at Stanford are:
Related pages
- Volunteers in Asia - American non-profit organization closely related to Stanford
Images for kids
-
Interior of the Stanford Memorial Church at the center of the Main Quad
-
Lou Henry Hoover House, the official residence of the University President
-
Herbert Hoover, 31st President of the United States (BA, 1895)
-
Susan Rice, 27th United States Ambassador to the United Nations (BA, 1986)
-
Julián Castro, 16th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; former presidential candidate (BA, 1996)
-
Sandra Day O'Connor, Former Associate Justice of the United States (BA, 1950)
-
Anthony Kennedy, Former Associate Justice of the United States (LLB, 1961)
-
Stephen Breyer, Associate Justice of the United States (BA, 1959)
-
Dianne Feinstein, U.S. Senator from California and former Mayor of San Francisco (BA, 1955)
-
Cory Booker, U.S. Senator from New Jersey; former presidential candidate (BA, 1991; MA, 1992)
-
Mitt Romney, U.S. Senator from Utah, former Governor of Massachusetts, and former presidential candidate (Did not graduate)
-
Jeff Merkley, U.S. Senator from Oregon (BA, 1979)
-
Adam Schiff, U.S. Representative from California (BA, 1982)
-
Philippe of Belgium, 7th King of the Belgians (MA, 1985)
-
Yukio Hatoyama, 93rd Prime Minister of Japan (PhD, 1976)
-
Rishi Sunak, British politician and Chancellor of the Exchequer (MBA, 2006)
-
Sally Ride, astronaut and physicist; first woman in space (MS, 1975; PhD, 1978)
-
Tom Steyer, billionaire hedge fund manager and former presidential candidate (MBA, 1983)
-
Carly Fiorina, CEO of Hewlett-Packard, former presidential candidate (BA, 1976)
-
Mukesh Ambani, billionaire business magnate and chairman of Reliance Industries (Did not graduate)
-
Peter Thiel, billionaire venture capitalist and co-founder of PayPal (BA, 1989; JD, 1992)
-
Larry Page, co-founder and former CEO of Google (MS, 1997)
-
Jerry Yang, co-founder and CEO of Yahoo! (BS, MS, 1990)
-
Reed Hastings, co-founder and CEO of Netflix (MS 1988)
-
Sam Harris, author and public intellectual (BA, 2000)
-
Gretchen Carlson, broadcast journalist and former host of Fox & Friends (BA, 1990)
-
Rachel Maddow, journalist and host of The Rachel Maddow Show (BA, 1994)
-
Raymond Burr, Emmy Award-winning actor
-
Reese Witherspoon, Academy Award-winning actress (Did not graduate)
-
Jennifer Connelly, Academy Award-winning actress (Did not graduate)
-
Sterling K. Brown, Emmy Award-winning actor (BA, 1998)
-
Alexander Payne, Academy Award-winning film director (BA, 1983)
-
Tiger Woods, golfer (Did not graduate)
-
John Elway, former football quarterback and general manager of the Denver Broncos (BS, 1983)
-
John McEnroe, tennis player (Did not graduate)
-
John Steinbeck, Nobel Prize-winning author of The Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, and Of Mice and Men (Did not graduate)