Colleges of the University of Cambridge in the context of "Wolfson College, Cambridge"

A college (Latin: collegium) may be a tertiary educational institution (sometimes awarding degrees), part of a collegiate university, an institution offering vocational education, a further education institution, or a secondary school.

In most of the world, a college may be a high school or secondary school, a college of further education, a training institution that awards trade qualifications, a higher-education provider that does not have university status (often without its own degree-awarding powers), or a constituent part of a university. In the United States, a college may offer undergraduate programs – either as an independent institution or as the undergraduate program of a university – or it may be a residential college of a university or a community college, referring to (primarily public) higher education institutions that aim to provide affordable and accessible education, usually limited to two-year associate degrees. The word "college" is generally also used as a synonym for a university in the US, and as used in phrases such as "college students" and "going to college" it is understood to mean any degree granting institution, whether denominated a school, an institute, a college, or a university.

The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the world's third-oldest university in continuous operation. The university's founding followed the arrival of scholars who left the University of Oxford for Cambridge after a dispute with local townspeople. The two ancient English universities, although sometimes described as rivals, share many common features and are often jointly referred to as Oxbridge.

In 1231, 22 years after its founding, the university was recognised with a royal charter, granted by King Henry III. The University of Cambridge includes 31 semi-autonomous constituent colleges and more than 150 academic departments, faculties, and other institutions organised into six schools. The largest department is Cambridge University Press and Assessment, which contains the oldest university press in the world, with £1 billion of annual revenue and with 100 million learners. All of the colleges are self-governing institutions within the university, managing their own personnel and policies, and all students are required to have a college affiliation within the university. Undergraduate teaching at Cambridge is centred on weekly small-group supervisions in the colleges with lectures, seminars, laboratory work, and occasionally further supervision provided by the central university faculties and departments.

Christ's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college includes the Master, the Fellows of the College, and about 450 undergraduate and 250 graduate students. The college was founded by William Byngham in 1437 as God's House. In 1505, the college was granted a new royal charter, was given a substantial endowment by Lady Margaret Beaufort, and changed its name to Christ's College, becoming the twelfth of the Cambridge colleges to be founded in its modern form.

Alumni of the college include the poet John Milton, the naturalist Charles Darwin, as well as the Nobel Laureates Martin Evans, James Meade, Alexander Todd, Duncan Haldane, and John Clarke. The Master is Lord McDonald of Salford.

Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at Oxford or Cambridge. Trinity has some of the most distinctive architecture in Cambridge with its Great Court said to be the largest enclosed courtyard in Europe. Academically, Trinity performs exceptionally as measured by the Tompkins Table (the annual unofficial league table of Cambridge colleges), coming top from 2011 to 2017, and regaining the position in 2024.

Members of Trinity have been awarded 34 Nobel Prizes out of the 121 received by members of the University of Cambridge (more than any other Oxford or Cambridge college). Members of the college have received four Fields Medals, one Turing Award and one Abel Prize. Trinity alumni include Francis Bacon, six British prime ministers (the highest number of any Cambridge college), physicists Isaac Newton, James Clerk Maxwell, Ernest Rutherford and Niels Bohr, mathematicians Srinivasa Ramanujan and Charles Babbage, poets Lord Byron and Lord Tennyson, English jurist Edward Coke, writers Vladimir Nabokov and A. A. Milne, historians Lord Macaulay and G. M. Trevelyan, and philosophers Ludwig Wittgenstein and Bertrand Russell (who the college expelled before reaccepting). Two members of the British royal family have studied at Trinity and been awarded degrees: Prince William of Gloucester and Edinburgh, who gained an MA in 1790, and King Charles III, who was awarded a lower second class BA in 1970.

Cambridge (/ˈkeɪmbrɪdʒ/ KAYM-brij) is a city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, 55 miles (89 km) north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of the City of Cambridge was 145,700; the population of the wider built-up area (which extends outside the city council area) was 181,137. There is archaeological evidence of settlement in the area as early as the Bronze Age, and Cambridge became an important trading centre during the Roman and Viking eras. The first town charters were granted in the 12th century, although modern city status was not officially conferred until 1951.

The city is well known as the home of the University of Cambridge, which was founded in 1209 and consistently ranks among the best universities in the world. The buildings of the university include King's College Chapel, Cavendish Laboratory, and the Cambridge University Library, one of the largest legal deposit libraries in the world. The city's skyline is dominated by several college buildings, along with the spire of the Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church, and the chimney of Addenbrooke's Hospital. Anglia Ruskin University, which evolved from the Cambridge School of Art and the Cambridgeshire College of Arts and Technology, also has its main campus in the city.

Corpus Christi College (full name: "The College of Corpus Christi and the Blessed Virgin Mary", often shortened to "Corpus") is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. From the late 14th century to the early 19th century it was also commonly known as Bene't College.

The college is notable as the only one founded by Cambridge townspeople: it was established in 1352 by the Guild of Corpus Christi and the Guild of the Blessed Virgin Mary, making it the sixth-oldest college in Cambridge. With around 300 undergraduates and 200 postgraduates, it also has the second smallest student body of the traditional colleges of the university, after Peterhouse.

Peterhouse is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in England, founded in 1284 by Hugh de Balsham, Bishop of Ely. Peterhouse has around 300 undergraduate and 175 graduate students, and 54 fellows.

Peterhouse alumni are notably eminent within the natural sciences, including scientists Lord Kelvin, Henry Cavendish, Charles Babbage, James Clerk Maxwell, James Dewar, Frank Whittle, and five Nobel prize winners in science: Sir John Kendrew, Sir Aaron Klug, Archer Martin, Max Perutz, and Michael Levitt. Peterhouse alumni also include Lord Chancellors, Lord Chief Justices, important poets such as Thomas Gray, the first Anglican Bishop of New York Samuel Provoost, the first British Fields Medallist Klaus Roth, Oscar-winning film director Sam Mendes and comedian David Mitchell. British Prime Minister Augustus FitzRoy, 3rd Duke of Grafton, and Elijah Mudenda, second prime minister of Zambia, also studied at the college.