List of colleges and universities in the San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area is home to many colleges and universities. The three most notable universities are Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, and University of California, San Francisco all considered among the most prestigious universities in the world. The Bay Area is home to two of the twenty-eight Jesuit universities in the U.S.: Santa Clara University, and University of San Francisco ; these are also two of the three oldest California colleges. The third, San Jose State University, is the founding campus of the California State University system, and is the oldest public institution of higher education on the West Coast of the United States. Saint Mary's College of California was founded in 1863 by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of San Francisco. In 2008, there were approximately 588,000 students enrolled in college or graduate school. The San Francisco Bay Area population is near the top in the Nation for overall education level with approximately 41 percent of residents aged 25 years and over having a bachelor's degree or higher. The San Francisco and San Jose Primary Metropolitan Statistical Areas rank third and fourth in college graduates, ahead of Boston and behind only Boulder–Longmont, CO PMSA and Stamford–Norwalk, CT PMSA. The Oakland PMSA ranks eleventh.
