University of Utah

University of Utah International Student Insurance

The University of Utah, located in Salt Lake City, Utah, was established in 1850. It was founded as the University of Deseret by the General Assembly of the provisional State of Deseret, the precursor to Utah. Due to lack of funding, the university suspended classes from 1853–1857. It gained its current name in 1892 and moved to its current location in 1900. From there, its curriculum expanded. The College of Mines and Earth Sciences opened in 1901, the School of Medicine in 1905, and the College of Law in 1913. Today, the University of Utah enrolls more than 31,000 students and counting each year. The school colors are red, white, black, and gray, and its athletic nickname is the Utes.

Academic Offerings

The university offers more than 75 undergraduate degree programs and more than 90 graduate degree programs across its 17 academic colleges, among them colleges of architecture & planning, business, dentistry, education, law, medicine, pharmacy, and social work. Some programs of note are the Department of Ballet, which offers the top-ranked ballet and ballroom dance program in the U.S.; the Department of Biology, whose focus on genetics has led to the establishment of the Genetic Science Learning Center, and the School of Dentistry, founded in 2012 and the university’s first new college in 60 years.

On Campus

The campus has several noteworthy attractions. The Utah Museum of Fine Arts features rotating exhibits of modern and contemporary art, as well as permanent exhibitions for European, African, and Asian art. Kingsbury Hall serves as the university’s center for performing arts. The Natural History Museum of Utah features collections related to anthropology, paleontology, mineralogy, botany, and more, with a focus on specimens from Utah and the Intermountain West region.

Notable Alumni

Notable University of Utah alumni include politician Karl Rove; Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich; authors Orson Scott Card and Stephen Covey; Ed Catmull, founder of Pixar Animation Studios; Nolan Bushnell, founder of Chuck E. Cheese; and David Neeleman, founder of the airline JetBlue.

^{Photo credit}