A campus is traditionally the land on which a
college
A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...
or
university and related
institutional buildings are situated. Usually a college campus includes
libraries,
lecture halls,
residence halls, student centers or dining halls, and park-like settings.
A modern campus is a collection of buildings and grounds that belong to a given institution, either academic or non-academic. Examples include the
Googleplex and the
Apple Campus
The Apple Campus is the former corporate headquarters of Apple Inc. from 1993 until 2017, when it was largely replaced by Apple Park, though it is still used by Apple as office and lab space. The campus is located at 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertin ...
.
Etymology
The word derives from a
Latin word for "field" and was first used to describe the large field adjacent
Nassau Hall
Nassau Hall, colloquially known as Old Nassau, is the oldest building at Princeton University in Princeton, Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. In 1783 it served as the United States Capitol building for four months. At the time it was built ...
of the College of New Jersey (now
Princeton University) in 1774. The field separated Princeton from the small nearby town.
Some other American colleges later adopted the word to describe individual fields at their own institutions, but "campus" did not yet describe the whole university property. A school might have one space called a campus, another called a field, and still another called a yard.
History
The tradition of a campus began with the medieval
European universities where the students and teachers lived and worked together in a
cloister
A cloister (from Latin ''claustrum'', "enclosure") is a covered walk, open gallery, or open arcade running along the walls of buildings and forming a quadrangle or garth. The attachment of a cloister to a cathedral or church, commonly against a ...
ed environment.
The notion of the importance of the setting to academic life later migrated to America, and early colonial educational institutions were based on the Scottish and English collegiate system.
[
The campus evolved from the cloistered model in Europe to a diverse set of independent styles in the United States. Early colonial colleges were all built in proprietary styles, with some contained in single buildings, such as the campus of Princeton University or arranged in a version of the cloister reflecting American values, such as Harvard's. Both the campus designs and the architecture of colleges throughout the country have evolved in response to trends in the broader world,]
Modern day campus. Retrieved 10 April 2022. with most representing several different contemporary and historical styles and arrangements.
Uses
The meaning expanded to include the whole institutional
real property, property during the 20th century, with the old meaning persisting into the 1950s in some places.
Office buildings
Sometimes the lands on which company office buildings sit, along with the buildings, are called campuses. The
Microsoft Campus
The Microsoft campus is the corporate headquarters of Microsoft, located in Redmond, Washington, United States, a part of the Seattle metropolitan area. Microsoft initially moved onto the grounds of the campus on February 26, 1986, shortly befor ...
in
Redmond, Washington
Redmond is a city in King County, Washington, United States, located east of Seattle. The population was 73,256 at the 2020 census, up from 54,144 in 2010.
Redmond is best known as the home of Microsoft and Nintendo of America.
With an a ...
, is a good example of this usage. Hospitals and even airports sometimes use the term to describe the territory of their respective facilities.
Universities
The word ''campus'' has also been applied to European universities, although some such institutions (in particular,
"ancient" universities such as
Bologna,
Padua,
Oxford and
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge becam ...
) are characterized by ownership of individual buildings in
university town
A college town or university town is a community (often a separate town or city, but in some cases a town/city neighborhood or a district) that is dominated by its university population. The university may be large, or there may be several s ...
-like urban settings rather than sprawling park-like lawns in which buildings are placed.
See also
*
Campus novel
A campus novel, also known as an academic novel, is a novel whose main action is set in and around the campus of a university. The genre in its current form dates back to the early 1950s. ''The Groves of Academe'' by Mary McCarthy, published in 19 ...
*
Campus university
A campus university is a British term for a university situated on one site, with student accommodation, teaching and research facilities, and leisure activities all together. It is derived from the Latin term campus, meaning "a flat expanse of la ...
*
Satellite campus
A satellite campus or branch campus or regional campus is a campus of a university or college that is physically at a distance from the original university or college area. This branch campus may be located in a different city, state, or country ...
*
References
External links
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{{Authority control
Universities and colleges