University of Sidney

The University of Sydney (USYD) is a public research university in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in both Australia and Oceania.^[14] One of Australia’s six sandstone universities, it was one of the world’s first universities to admit students solely on academic merit, and opened its doors to women on the same basis as men.^[15] The university comprises eight academic faculties and university schools, through which it offers bachelor, master and doctoral degrees.

Five Nobel and two Crafoord laureates have been affiliated with the university as graduates and faculty.^[16] The university has educated eight Australian prime ministers, including incumbent Anthony Albanese; two governors-general of Australia; 13 premiers of New South Wales; and 26 justices of the High Court of Australia, including five chief justices. The university has produced 110 Rhodes Scholars and 19 Gates Scholars. The University of Sydney is a member of the Group of Eight, CEMS, the Association of Pacific Rim Universities and the Association of Commonwealth Universities.

In 1848, William Wentworth, a University of Cambridge alumnus, and Sir Charles Nicholson, a University of Edinburgh Medical School alumnus, proposed in the Legislative Council a plan to expand the existing Sydney College into a university. Wentworth argued that it would provide the opportunity for “the child of every class, to become great and useful in the destinies of his country” and that a state secular university was imperative for a society aspiring towards self-government.

So far from being an institution for the rich, I take It to be an institution for the poor. … I trust that, from the pregnant womb of this institution will arise a long list of illustrious names—of statesmen—of patriots—of philanthropists—of philosophers—of poets and of heroes, who will shed a deathless halo, not only on their country, but upon the University which called them into being.

He promoted access on the basis of merit rather than religious or social status. It took two attempts on Wentworth’s behalf before the plan was finally adopted.

The university was established via the passage of the University of Sydney Act 1850 (NSW) on 24 September 1850,^[20] and was assented on 1 October 1850 by governor Sir Charles Fitzroy.^[21] Wentworth was among the first members of the university’s senate, mentioned in the governor’s proclamation alongside three religious ministers.^[18] Two years later, the university was inaugurated on 11 October 1852 in the Big Schoolroom of what is now Sydney Grammar School. The first principal was John Woolley,^[22] the first professor of chemistry and experimental physics was John Smith.^[23] Sir William Charles Windeyer was the first graduate.^[24] The university was Australia’s first, as well as being one of the first public, non-denominational and secular universities in the British Empire.^[18] On 27 February 1858, the university received a royal charter from Queen Victoria, giving degrees conferred by the university rank and recognition equal to those given by universities in the United Kingdom.

In 1858, the passage of the Electoral Act provided for the university to become a constituency for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as soon as there were 100 graduates of the university holding higher degrees eligible for candidacy. This seat in the New South Wales legislature was first filled in 1876, but was abolished in 1880, one year after its second member, Sir Edmund Barton, who later became the first Prime Minister of Australia, was elected to the Legislative Assembly.

The university was one of the first in the world to admit women on an equal basis with men, doing so from 1881. In 1885 the first women to receive BA degrees from the university were Mary Elizabeth Brown and Isola Florence Thompson,^[24] while Thompson became the first woman to graduate with an MA in 1887.^[28]

Most of the estate of John Henry Challis was bequeathed to the university, which received a sum of £200,000 in 1889. This was thanks in part due to Sir William Montagu Manning (chancellor 1878–95) who argued against the claims by British tax commissioners. The following year, seven professorships were created in anatomy, zoology, engineering, history, law, logic and mental philosophy, and modern literature.