What's the difference between a college and a university?

milltown

What's the difference between a college and a university?

Does anybody know? The question was asked at lunch today and nobody knew the answer.

SoupyNorman

higher accreditation i think...

A Dub in Glasgo

Have a read here

I don't know if it answers your question

CuLT

u·ni·ver·si·ty Audio pronunciation of "university" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (yn-vûrs-t)
n. pl. u·ni·ver·si·ties

1. An institution for higher learning with teaching and research facilities constituting a graduate school and professional schools that award master's degrees and doctorates and an undergraduate division that awards bachelor's degrees.
2. The buildings and grounds of such an institution.
3. The body of students and faculty of such an institution.

col·lege Audio pronunciation of "college" ( P ) Pronunciation Key (klj)
n.

1.
1. An institution of higher learning that grants the bachelor's degree in liberal arts or science or both.
2. An undergraduate division or school of a university offering courses and granting degrees in a particular field.
3. A school, sometimes but not always a university, offering special instruction in professional or technical subjects.
4. The students, faculty, and administration of such a school or institution.
5. The building or buildings occupied by such a school or institution.
6. Chiefly British. A self-governing society of scholars for study or instruction, incorporated within a university.
7. An institution in France for secondary education that is not supported by the state.
2.
1. A body of persons having a common purpose or shared duties: a college of surgeons.
2. An electoral college.
3. A body of clerics living together on an endowment.

Looks like a University caters for research, and a college doesn't.
And a college can't grant a masters.

Draupnir

Colleges cant give out their own Degrees and that kind of thing, DIT for example give out UCD approved degrees I believe and thats the way it works for every college in the business, its DCU, UCD, TCD and the many other universities around Ireland that provide the actual pieces of paper.

skywalker

CuLT wrote:

Looks like a University caters for research, and a college doesn't.
And a college can't grant a masters.

thats definitely not it. i think draupnir hit the nail on the head though.

pickarooney

Oxford and Cambridge Universities are made up of individual colleges - Balliol, Jesus, etc.
UCD stands for University College Dublin - so which is it?

Draupnir

UCD is both a college and a university since it provides both degree and diploma courses.

roar_ie

Draupnir wrote:

Colleges cant give out their own Degrees and that kind of thing, DIT for example give out UCD approved degrees I believe and thats the way it works for every college in the business, its DCU, UCD, TCD and the many other universities around Ireland that provide the actual pieces of paper.

ahem....
DIT give out their own degrees, otherwise the piece of paper i got on saturday is lying to me.

simu

pickarooney wrote:

Oxford and Cambridge Universities are made up of individual colleges - Balliol, Jesus, etc.
UCD stands for University College Dublin - so which is it?

UCD, UCC, NUIG etc are colleges of the NUI (National University of Ireland)?

Draupnir

roar_ie wrote:

ahem....
DIT give out their own degrees, otherwise the piece of paper i got on saturday is lying to me.

yes they do, might point was simply that you piece of paper (congrats by the way) was accredited by one of the Dublin universities, either DCU, TCD or UCD, and I believe its UCD who do the DIT ones, since DIT dont have the power to accredit there own.

ps. accredit might be the wrong word but I cant think of the right one at the minute

egan007

CuLT wrote:

Looks like a University caters for research, and a college doesn't.
And a college can't grant a masters.

Colleges can grant masters

damnyanks

IT's are different to colleges though arent they?

Colleges can get their schemes approved by HETAC as well. Some of the private colleges in Dublin seem to get accrediation from UK Uni's

humanji

I think it also has to do with the size of the college itself, as in the amount of students and the facilities. I went to college in Carlow IT and they were building new sections onto it and mumbling something about planning on getting "university status".

Draupnir

A bit like Churches and Cathredals?? Oops, thats another hornets nest!!!

Maybe Carlow wanna start accrediting their own degrees or something, thats just a hunch about them wanting University status.

tribble

Draupnir wrote:

Colleges cant give out their own Degrees and that kind of thing, DIT for example give out UCD approved degrees I believe and thats the way it works for every college in the business, its DCU, UCD, TCD and the many other universities around Ireland that provide the actual pieces of paper.

Yawn, load of bollox...

In the past DIT handed out Dublin University degrees (bachelor's).
They were fully fleded TCD degrees 'cept for they didn't come with
a then standard doctorate of divinity.

10/15 years ago they were granted permission to hand out their own bachelors.

4/5 years ago they were granted permission to hand out Masters AND Doctorates.

They have since applied for University status.

flogen

Also, University graduates can vote for members of the Seánad, college graduates can't... but that's only a minor difference

flogen

fintan

DIT failed to win university status the last time they applied for it as they did not do enough research.

Sorry I cant find the where I read that, and there may have been other reasons.

Draupnir

tribble wrote:

Yawn, load of bollox...

Bit harsh that!!! Some neg rep is winging its way to you for that thanks very much.

If indeed you are correct, which Im not sure you are, as regards the awarding of degrees, then well done, but quite frankly, absolutely no need for the attitude.

tribble

Draupnir wrote:

Bit harsh that!!! Some neg rep is winging its way to you for that thanks very much.

If indeed you are correct, which Im not sure you are, as regards the awarding of degrees, then well done, but quite frankly, absolutely no need for the attitude.

piss off

Raam

flogen wrote:

Also, University graduates can vote for members of the Seánad, college graduates can't... but that's only a minor difference

flogen

I think DCU, UL and maybe some of the ITs only got this a while back, even though they should have it ages ago...

http://www.dcu.ie/news/press/2004/p0404c.shtml

tribble

Universities: The existing state-supported universities all award their own degrees and other awards.
Institutes of Technology: The Dublin Institute of Technology also makes its own awards. The other institutes of technology grant degrees, diplomas and certificates, which are validated by either the Higher Education and Training Awards Council (HETAC) or the Further Education and Training Awards Council (FETAC).

http://oasis.gov.ie/education/third_level_education/third_level_qualifications.html

DIT is a publicly funded institution of higher education and makes its own awards at Certificate, Diploma, Degree, Masters and PhD levels.

http://www.learn4good.com/great_technical_colleges/colleges_ireland.htm


An international panel rejected DIT's application for university status in 1999 due to the low quantity of research conducted. It is now upgrading its research and staff qualifications in another attempt at university status, and quality assurance has been introduced for each course.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3501-412661,00.html

tribble

Sleepy

So Draupnir is only talking a "load of bollox" when he states that the difference is the ability to acredit their courses but when you state it to be so and back yourself up with linkage it's not? That makes a lot of sense.

Draupnir

cheers for the back up Sleepy, I dont quite understand how my concise explanation of what Tribble just says was a boring load of bollox compared to his little encyclopedia entry, ah well!

Capt'n Midnight

By all accounts UCD where upset when NIHE became TWO universities while they remained only part of a university

Many universities have only one college - but in places like oxford there are lots of colleges (seperate campuses) in the university ...

Sleepy

What's NIHE stand for?

Draupnir

National Institute of Higher Education? Think its the old name for DCU

In_Diana_Jones

tribble wrote:

Universities: The existing state-supported universities all award their own degrees and other awards.
Institutes of Technology: The Dublin Institute of Technology also makes its own awards. The other institutes of technology grant degrees, diplomas and certificates, which are validated by either the Higher Education and Training Awards Council (HETAC) or the Further Education and Training Awards Council (FETAC).

http://oasis.gov.ie/education/third_level_education/third_level_qualifications.html

DIT is a publicly funded institution of higher education and makes its own awards at Certificate, Diploma, Degree, Masters and PhD levels.

http://www.learn4good.com/great_technical_colleges/colleges_ireland.htm


An international panel rejected DIT's application for university status in 1999 due to the low quantity of research conducted. It is now upgrading its research and staff qualifications in another attempt at university status, and quality assurance has been introduced for each course.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3501-412661,00.html

tribble

DKIT also grant their own degree's. Also, they can grant both Masters and PhD's

Jivin Turkey

I went to Bovine University. It can grant both degrees and masters.

flogen

King Raam wrote:

I think DCU, UL and maybe some of the ITs only got this a while back, even though they should have it ages ago...

http://www.dcu.ie/news/press/2004/p0404c.shtml

Yeah, I think DCU can elect 1 person or something, while UCD, UCC and UCG (I think) elect more.. I think Trinity might be able to elect one too... not sure about the IT's though.

there was also a bill a while ago that would allow Irish graduates of any university in the world to vote in the Seánad elections... not sure if it was passed though.

flogen

Tom Dunne

Universities are concerned with advancement of knowledge, colleges are primarily concerned with transferring that knowledge.

As many people have said, universities confer their own qualifications (up to PhD) whereas colleges confer qualifications accredited by bodies such as Hetac (Higher Education Training Awards Council) or other universities. Hetac, contrary to popular belief, can confer awards up to PhD also.

MojoMaker

Draupnir wrote:

yes they do, might point was simply that you piece of paper (congrats by the way) was accredited by one of the Dublin universities, either DCU, TCD or UCD, and I believe its UCD who do the DIT ones, since DIT dont have the power to accredit there own.

ps. accredit might be the wrong word but I cant think of the right one at the minute

FFS, DIT never had any association with UCD...jebus, all degree programmes were ratified by Trinity.

Without denigrating anyone who graduated from UCD (myself included) but their degrees ain't worth a **** out in the professional environment, which is why you see so many students going on to masters level and then following professional training of some sort. The most irrelevent degree in the whole of Ireland's university sector has to be UCD's B.Comm - before we started this we were told in school it was the one to have - ain't worth a flying **** out there. DIT or DCU leagues ahead of UCD skills-wise, unless you want to be a doctor of course. But back in the real world, UCD is for academics, the other universities are for people that want to actually work and earn money.

This is from an icredible amount of experience before anyone feels like neg-repping me, lol.

Draupnir

I wasnt sure it was UCD that did the DIT degrees, thats why i said I believe as opposed to being concrete about it. I just knew that someone else was pulling the strings if ya get my drift.

Dave

A collage is a work art consisting of a composition of materials in unified colours or lines.

A university on the other hand isn't

Easy.

aodh_rua

I presume the question is really what is the difference between IT's and universities (in the Oxbridge model Colleges come together to form a university a la University of Dublin has a Trinity College). The posts about research pretty much hit the nail on the head. The primary role of the IT sector is to produce highly trained vocational graduates who are equipped to work in industry in hands-on positions (programmers, lab technicians, etc.). The universities exist to provide professional training which equips graduates with a wider variety of skills and the opportunity to engage in research, and further study. This model has changed of late with the increasing research focus in some of the larger IT's (probably as an effort to recruit high calibre staff). However, central government are wary of extending the university banner to encompass the likes of DIT as the title has a meaning which does not cover the stated aim of the IT sector. Perhaps they could instead introduce the continental notion of a technical university which provides training a la the IT's and also carries out research.

As for the Seanad constituencies - as of now the only graduates entitled to vote are those of the NUI (3 seats) and those of the University of Dublin (3 seats). The committee mentionned in the DCU press release was merely issuing recommendations, any change will require a referendum which is unlikey to happen in advance of the next general election.