San Francisco, CA
Founded in 1855
University of San Francisco (USF) is a private Catholic university located in San Francisco, California, USA. It was founded in 1855 and is situated between the Golden Gate Bridge and Golden Gate Park. The university is often referred to as "The Hilltop" due to its campus being located at the peak of a hill in San Francisco, a fitting nickname. The university has nearly 11,000 students, including more than 6,800 undergraduates and more than 4,200 graduate students. The University of San Francisco ranked 97th in the 2020 U.S. News Best Colleges rankings and was once named by The Wall Street Journal as one of the top 100 business schools in the world. Its programs, such as Entrepreneurship, have even surpassed top schools like Stanford University and the University of California, Los Angeles, ranking first in California. It was also the first university in the U.S. to offer a Master’s in Financial Analysis. Notable graduate programs include Public Service (McCarthy Center), Pacific Rim Studies (Asian and American Studies), Law, Education, Business, Nursing, and Environmental Management. Over 90% of freshmen live on campus, and the university offers about 100 student clubs and organizations, including fraternities and sororities. The university hosts an annual entrepreneurship competition, where all entries have a chance to receive venture capital funding from investment firms, attracting nationwide attention. Notable alumni include: Intel CEO Andy Grove, Starbucks founder Gordon Bowker, Adobe founder Charles M. Geschke, Sina Corporation director Charles Chen, and former PwC chairman Dominic Tarantino.