Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences in the context of Somerville, Massachusetts

Tufts University is a private research university in Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts, United States, with additional facilities in Boston and Grafton, as well as Talloires, France. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learning. For much of the 20th century, Jackson College for Women was the coordinate college of Tufts. Tufts remained a small liberal arts college until the 1970s, when it became a larger research university offering doctorates in several disciplines.

Tufts enrolls over 13,000 students. It offers over 90 undergraduate and 160 graduate programs across ten schools in the greater Boston area and from a campus in France. It has the country's oldest graduate school of international relations, the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. The largest school is the School of Arts and Sciences, which includes both the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University, which is affiliated with the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. The School of Engineering offers an entrepreneurial focus through its Gordon Institute. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and is a member of the Association of American Universities.

The Jackson College for Women, also sometimes known as Jackson College of Tufts University, was established in 1910 as a coordinate college associated with Tufts College, and later Tufts University, and located in Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts.The Jackson College and the Tufts College of Liberal Arts shared the same courses and faculty.But for much of its existence, Jackson College had its own student activities and student government, separate from that of Tufts, and its own dean.It was a prestigious women's college at its peak;in comparison to the Tufts undergraduate schools that men attended, Jackson College was considered harder to get admitted to and to have an academically stronger group of students.Students of this era were very proud of being associated with Jackson and felt identity with, and loyalty to, the Jackson name.

Over time, things changed, and female students felt more of a belonging to Tufts University itself.Jackson College was subsumed into the Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences in stages in 1980, 1999–2000, and 2002, after which it remained a legal entity in name only.

The School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University (Museum School, SMFA at Tufts, or SMFA; formerly the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) is a dedicated art school within Tufts University, a private research university in Massachusetts. SMFA is part of Tufts University's largest school, the School of Arts and Sciences, and offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees that combine studio arts training with interdisciplinary liberal arts and science education.

It is affiliated with the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. SMFA is a member of the Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design (AICAD), a consortium of several dozen leading art schools in the United States, and is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education (NECHE).

The School of Engineering is one of the ten schools that comprise Tufts University. The school offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in several engineering disciplines and computer science fields. Along with the School of Arts and Sciences (A&S) and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, the School of Engineering is located on the university's main campus in Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. Currently, the engineering school enrolls more than 800 full-time undergraduates and 600 graduate students. The school employs over 100 full-time and part-time faculty members.