The most well-known college in Philadelphia is the University of Pennsylvania, which was established in 1740 and is considered to be part of the prestigious "Ivy League." The University of Pennsylvania is usually just called "Penn" in popular media. Penn has been a major research university in the United States for many years and bears the distinction of being founded by Benjamin Franklin, one of the country's founding fathers and a signer of the American Declaration of Independence. The college is highly selective. Penn only admitted 14.2% of students in 2010, admitting only 3,830 freshmen that year for a target enrollment just above 2,400. Penn is also a major graduate college, and almost 50% of Penn's 20,643 students in 2010 were postgraduates.
A couple of Philadelphia's major research universities were founded in the late 1800s by private philanthropists to help educate the people of Pennsylvania. Drexel, one of these schools, remains private today and enjoys a prestigious academic reputation. Drexel is well-known for its engineering and science schools, and it is consistently ranked as one of the country's best colleges by U.S. News and World Report. Drexel had 18,517 students in 2010, and some 7,000 of these were pursuing graduate degrees.
Temple University was also founded in the late 1800s in Philadelphia. Unlike Drexel and Penn, Temple is considered a public university affiliated with and supported by the state government of Pennsylvania. Like Drexel and Penn, Temple is a highly ranked college with a well-respected academic program. Temple is located in suburban Philadelphia, a few miles north of the central city in the town of Ambler. As of 2009, just under 39,000 students attend Temple University. About 5,000 of these students are in the graduate school, which awards degrees in medicine, law, dentistry and pharmacy science.
In addition to four-year universities, the city of Philadelphia is home to a number of community and junior college programs. Among these is the Community College of Philadelphia. The Community College of Philadelphia has 16,840 full-time equivalent students, and many more who take classes on a part-time basis. The majority of students at the Community College of Philadelphia are older than 25, and the college offers a number of retraining and career enhancement programs for working adults. The Community College of Philadelphia is the city's largest higher education institution.