A national university is generally a university created or managed by a government, but which may at the same time operate autonomously without direct control by the state.
Some national universities are associated with national cultural or political aspirations. For example, the National University of Ireland during the early days of Irish independence collected a large amount of information about the Irish language and Irish culture. In Argentina, the national universities are the result of the 1918 Argentine university reform and subsequent reforms, which were intended to provide a secular university system without direct clerical or government influence by bestowing self government on the institutions.
Famous quotes containing the words national and/or universities:
“Universal suffrage should rest upon universal education. To this end, liberal and permanent provision should be made for the support of free schools by the State governments, and, if need be, supplemented by legitimate aid from national authority.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“In universities and intellectual circles, academics can guarantee themselves popularity—or, which is just as satisfying, unpopularity—by being opinionated rather than by being learned.”
—A.N. (Andrew Norman)