Colleges and Universities
Sonoma County, San Francisco North Bay, Ca. USA 

 

undergraduate level. It can also refer to schools which offer a vocational, business, engineering, or technical curriculum. The term can either refer to both a self-contained institution that has no graduate studies or to the undergraduate school of a full university (i.e. that also has a graduate school).

Colleges vary in terms of size, degree, and length of stay. Two-year colleges offer the Associates degree (A.A.) and four-year colleges offer the Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) or Bachelor of Sciences (B.S.) degree. These are usually primarily undergraduate institutions, although some might have limited programs at the graduate level.

Four - year institutions in the U.S. which emphasize the liberal arts are liberal arts colleges. These colleges traditionally emphasize interactive instruction (although research is still a component of these institutions). If not associated with a university, they are often categorized as residential and generally have smaller enrollment, class size, and teacher-student ratios than universities.

These colleges often encourage a high level of teacher-student interaction at the center of which are classes taught by full-time faculty rather than graduate student TAs (who sometimes teach the classes at Research I and other universities). The colleges are either coeducational, women's colleges, or men's colleges.