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The Association of American Universities (AAU) is a binational organization of leading research universities devoted to maintaining a strong system of academic research and education. It consists of 60 universities in the United States (both public and private) and two universities in Canada.

Organization

The AAU was founded in 1900 by a group of 14 Doctor of Philosophy degree–granting universities in the United States to strengthen and standardize American doctoral programs. American universities—starting with the Johns Hopkins University in 1876—were adopting the research-intensive German model of higher education. Lack of standardization damaged European universities' opinions of their American counterparts, however, and many American students attended graduate school in Europe instead of staying in the US. The presidents of Johns Hopkins, the University of Chicago, Columbia University, Harvard University, and the University of California sent a letter of invitation to nine other universities to meet at Chicago in February 1900 to promote and raise standards.^[1]

In 1914, the AAU began accrediting undergraduate education at its members and other schools. German universities used the "AAU Accepted List" to determine whether a college's graduates were qualified for graduate programs. Regional accreditation agencies existed in the US by the 1920s, and the AAU ended accrediting schools in 1948.^[2]

The AAU is made up of universities of varying sizes and missions. Today, 62 universities in the US and Canada are members and the primary purpose of the organization is to provide a forum for the development and implementation of institutional and national policies, in order to promote strong programs in academic research and scholarship and undergraduate, graduate, and professional education.

Benefits

The largest attraction of the AAU for many schools, especially nonmembers, is prestige. For example, in 2010 the chancellor of nonmember North Carolina State University described it as "the pre-eminent research-intensive membership group. To be a part of that organization is something N.C. State aspires to."^[3] A spokesman for nonmember University of Connecticut called it "perhaps the most elite organization in higher education. You'd probably be hard-pressed to find a major research university that didn't want to be a member of the AAU."^[4] In 2012, the new elected chancellor of University of Massachusetts Amherst, a nonmember of AAU, reaffirmed the framework goal of elevating the campus to AAU standards which inspire them to become a member in the near future, and called it a distinctive status.^[5] Because of the lengthy and difficult entrance process, boards of trustees, state legislators, and donors often see membership as evidence of the quality of a university.^[3]

The AAU acts as a lobbyist at its headquarters in the city of Washington, DC, for research and higher education funding and for policy and regulatory issues affecting research universities. The association holds two meetings annually, both in Washington. Separate meetings are held for university presidents, provosts, and other officials. Because the meetings are private they offer the opportunity for discussion without media coverage. Prominent government officials, businessmen, and others often speak to the groups.^[3]

Presidents

Statistics

As of 2004^[update], AAU members accounted for 58 percent^[a] of US universities' research grants and contract income and 52 percent of all doctorates awarded in the United States. Since 1999, 43 percent of all Nobel Prize winners and 74 percent of winners at US institutions have been affiliated with an AAU university. Approximately two thirds of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 2006 Class of Fellows are affiliated with an AAU university. The faculties at AAU universities include 2,993 members of the United States National Academies (82 percent of all members): the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine (2004).^[6]

• Undergraduate students: 1,044,759; 7 percent nationally


• Undergraduate degrees awarded: 235,328; 17 percent nationally


• Graduate students: 418,066; 20 percent nationally


• Master's degrees awarded: 106,971; 19 percent nationally


• Professional degrees awarded: 20,859; 25 percent nationally


• Doctorates awarded: 22,747; 52 percent nationally


• Postdoctoral fellows: 30,430; 67 percent nationally


• Students studying abroad: 57,205


• National Merit/Achievement Scholars (2004): 5,434; 63 percent nationally


• Faculty: approximately 72,000

Membership

AAU membership is by invitation only, which requires an affirmative vote of three fourths of current members. Invitations are considered periodically, based in part on an assessment of the breadth and quality of university programs of research and graduate education, as well as undergraduate education. The association ranks its members using four criteria: research spending, the percentage of faculty who are members of the National Academies, faculty awards, and citations. Two thirds of members can vote to revoke membership for poor rankings.^[7][8] As of 2010^[update] annual dues are $80,500.^[3] All 60 US members of the AAU are also classified as Highest Research Activity (R1) Universities by the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.

Institution[9]	State or Province	Control	Established	Year joined	Total students	Medical school[10][11] (LCME accredited)	Engineering program[12] (ABET accredited)
Boston University	Massachusetts	Private	1839	2012	30,009	Y	Y
Brandeis University	Massachusetts	Private	1948	1985	5,808	N	N
Brown University	Rhode Island	Private	1764	1933	8,619	Y	Y
California Institute of Technology	California	Private	1891	1934	2,231	N	Y
Carnegie Mellon University	Pennsylvania	Private	1900	1982	12,908	N	Y
Case Western Reserve University	Ohio	Private	1826	1969	11,340	Y	Y
Columbia University	New York	Private	1754	1900	29,250	Y	Y
Cornell University	New York	Private	1865	1900	21,904	Y	Y
Duke University	North Carolina	Private	1838	1938	14,600	Y	Y
Emory University	Georgia	Private	1836	1995	14,513	Y	N[b]
Georgia Institute of Technology	Georgia	Public	1885	2010	29,370	N	Y
Harvard University	Massachusetts	Private	1636	1900	21,000	Y	Y
Indiana University Bloomington	Indiana	Public	1820	1909	42,731	N	N
Iowa State University	Iowa	Public	1858	1958	36,001	N	Y
Johns Hopkins University	Maryland	Private	1876	1900	23,073	Y	Y
Massachusetts Institute of Technology	Massachusetts	Private	1861	1934	11,319	N	Y
McGill University	Quebec	Public	1821	1926	36,904	Y	Y
Michigan State University	Michigan	Public	1855	1964	49,300	Y	Y
New York University	New York	Private	1831	1950	53,711	Y	Y
Northwestern University	Illinois	Private	1851	1917	21,208	Y	Y
The Ohio State University	Ohio	Public	1870	1916	57,466	Y	Y
Pennsylvania State University	Pennsylvania	Public	1855	1958	45,518	Y	Y
Princeton University	New Jersey	Private	1746	1900	8,010	N	Y
Purdue University	Indiana	Public	1869	1958	39,256	N	Y
Rice University	Texas	Private	1912	1985	6,487	N	Y
Rutgers University–New Brunswick	New Jersey	Public	1766	1989	41,565	Y	Y
Stanford University	California	Private	1891	1900	15,877	Y	Y
Stony Brook University	New York	Public	1957	2001	25,272	Y	Y
Texas A&M University	Texas	Public	1876	2001	62,185	Y	Y
Tulane University	Louisiana	Private	1834	1958	13,462	Y	Y
The University of Arizona	Arizona	Public	1885	1985	40,223	Y	Y
The State University of New York at Buffalo	New York	Public	1846	1989	30,183	Y	Y
University of California, Berkeley	California	Public	1868	1900	36,204	N	Y
University of California, Davis	California	Public	1905	1996	34,175	Y	Y
University of California, Irvine	California	Public	1965	1996	29,588	Y	Y
University of California, Los Angeles	California	Public	1919	1974	42,163	Y	Y
University of California, San Diego	California	Public	1960	1982	30,310	Y	Y
University of California, Santa Barbara	California	Public	1944	1995	25,057	N	Y
The University of Chicago	Illinois	Private	1890	1900	14,954	Y	Y
University of Colorado Boulder	Colorado	Public	1876	1966	32,775	N	Y
University of Florida	Florida	Public	1853	1985	49,042	Y	Y
University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign	Illinois	Public	1867	1908	44,520	Y	Y
The University of Iowa	Iowa	Public	1847	1909	31,065	Y	Y
The University of Kansas	Kansas	Public	1865	1909	27,983	Y	Y
University of Maryland, College Park	Maryland	Public	1856	1969	37,631	Y	Y
University of Michigan	Michigan	Public	1817	1900	43,426	Y	Y
University of Minnesota	Minnesota	Public	1851	1908	51,853	Y	Y
University of Missouri	Missouri	Public	1839	1908	35,441	Y	Y
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill	North Carolina	Public	1789	1922	29,390	Y	Y[c]
University of Oregon	Oregon	Public	1876	1969	22,980	N	N
University of Pennsylvania	Pennsylvania	Private	1740	1900	24,630	Y	Y
University of Pittsburgh	Pennsylvania	Public	1787	1974	28,649	Y	Y
University of Rochester	New York	Private	1850	1941	10,290	Y	Y
University of Southern California	California	Private	1880	1969	39,958	Y	Y
University of Texas at Austin	Texas	Public	1883	1929	51,000	Y	Y
University of Toronto	Ontario	Public	1827	1926	84,000	Y	Y
University of Virginia	Virginia	Public	1819	1904	24,360	Y	Y
University of Washington	Washington	Public	1861	1950	43,762	Y	Y
University of Wisconsin–Madison	Wisconsin	Public	1848	1900	43,275	Y	Y
Vanderbilt University	Tennessee	Private	1873	1950	12,795	Y	Y
Washington University in St. Louis	Missouri	Private	1853	1923	14,117	Y	Y
Yale University	Connecticut	Private	1701	1900	12,223	Y	Y

Former members

• 
  Catholic University of America (1900–2002)

Departed as a result of "institutional emphases and energies" that differed from the other AAU members.^[15]

• 
  Clark University (1900–1999)

Departed because of a shift in the AAU's emphasis to large research universities.^[16]

• 
  University of Nebraska–Lincoln (1909–2011)

Removed from the AAU.^[8] Chancellor Harvey Perlman claimed that the lack of an on-campus medical school (the Medical Center is a separate campus of the University of Nebraska system) and the AAU's disregarding of USDA-funded agricultural research in its metrics hurt the university's performance in the association's internal ranking system.^[7]

• 
  Syracuse University (1966–2011)

Because of a dispute over how to count nonfederal grants, Syracuse voluntarily withdrew from the AAU in 2011. The Chronicle of Higher Education reported that after "it became clear that Syracuse wouldn't meet the association's revised membership criteria, university officials decided that they would leave the organization voluntarily, rather than face a vote like Nebraska's, and notified the leadership of their intentions."^[17]

Map of schools

Rice

Tulane

Buffalo

Arizona

UC Berkeley

UCLA

Oregon

USC

Stanford

Washington

Colorado

TAMU

Florida

Vanderbilt

Missouri

Penn State

Rutgers

Indiana

Michigan

Michigan State

Ohio State

Illinois

Iowa

Minnesota

Northwestern

Purdue

Wisconsin

Maryland

Iowa State

Kansas

Texas

Ga. Tech

Virginia

UNC

Duke

Pitt

Brown

Columbia

Cornell

UPenn

Princeton

Yale

Caltech

UC Davis

UC Irvine

UC San Diego

UC Santa Barbara

Emory

UChicago

Johns Hopkins

Four schools*

Wash U.

NYU

Stony Brook

Rochester

Case Western

Carnegie Mellon

Toronto

McGill

A map of the AAU schools, with private schools marked blue and public schools marked red. Four private schools in Greater Boston are not labeled separately due to space reasons: Harvard, MIT, Boston University, and Brandeis.

Advocacy

In 2014, the AAU supported the proposed Research and Development Efficiency Act arguing that the legislation "can lead to a long-needed reduction in the regulatory burden currently imposed on universities and their faculty members who conduct research on behalf of the federal government."^[18] According to the AAU, "too often federal requirements" for accounting for federal grant money "are ill-conceived, ineffective, and/or duplicative."^[18] This wastes the researchers' times and "reduces the time they can devote to discovery and innovation and increases institutional compliance costs."^[18] AAU institutions are frequently involved in US science policy debates. In 2008, AAU Vice President for Policy, Tobin Smith, co-authored a textbook on US science policy.

See also

• List of higher education associations and alliances

Notes

References

External links

• 
  Official website