Year of foundation: 1850
Approx. number of students: 31,000
Period of study: Early August-Early December; Early January-End April
MCI partner since: 2011
The City
Salt Lake City is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. The name of the city is often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC. It has an estimated population of approx. 180,000 the city, but lies in the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, which has a total estimated population of 1,130,000.
The city was founded in 1847 as Great Salt Lake City by Brigham Young and his Mormon followers, who extensively irrigated and cultivated the arid valley, and continued to face legal prosecution from the U.S. government for their practice of polygamy, which was officially discontinued in 1890 in order to gain statehood. Although Salt Lake City is still home to the headquarters of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS, also known as the Mormon Church), less than half the population of Salt Lake City proper is Mormon today.
Mining booms and the construction of the first transcontinental railroad initially brought economic growth, and the city was nicknamed the Crossroads of the West. Salt Lake City has since developed a strong outdoor recreation tourist industry based primarily on skiing. Salt Lake City was host to the 2002 Winter Olympics and is the industrial banking center of the United States.
The University
The University of Utah, also known as the U or the U of U, is a public, coeducational research university in Salt Lake City, Utah.. The university was established in 1850 as the University of Deseret by the General Assembly of the provisional State of Deseret, making it Utah's oldest institution of higher education. The university offers more than 100 undergraduate majors and more than 90 graduate degree programs.
Campus takes up 6.21 km2, including the Health Sciences complex, Research Park, and Fort Douglas. It is located on the east bench of the Salt Lake Valley, close to the Wasatch Range and approximately 2 miles east of downtown Salt Lake City. 