About University of Alaska Fairbanks

The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF or Alaska) is a public land-grant research college circles in College, Alaska; a suburb of Fairbanks. It is a flagship campus of the University of Alaska system. UAF was time-honored in 1917 and opened for classes in 1922. Originally named the Alaska Agricultural College and School of Mines, it became the University of Alaska in 1935. Fairbanks-based programs became the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 1975.

UAF is classified among “R2: Doctoral Universities – High research activity”. It is house to several major research units, including the Agricultural and Forestry Experiment Station; the Geophysical Institute, which operates the Poker Flat Research Range and several extra scientific centers; the Alaska Center for Energy and Power; the International Arctic Research Center; the Institute of Arctic Biology; the Institute of Marine Science; and the Institute of Northern Engineering. Located just 200 miles (320 km) south of the Arctic Circle, the Fairbanks campus’ unique location favors Arctic and northern research. UAF’s research specialties are Famous worldwide, most notably Arctic biology, Arctic engineering, geophysics, supercomputing, Ethnobotany and Alaska Native studies. The University of Alaska Museum of the North is also on the Fairbanks campus.

In supplement to the Fairbanks campus, UAF encompasses six rural and urban campuses: Bristol Bay Campus in Dillingham; Chukchi Campus in Kotzebue; the Fairbanks-based Interior Alaska Campus, which serves the state’s rural Interior; Kuskokwim Campus in Bethel; Northwest Campus in Nome; and the UAF Community and Technical College, with headquarters in downtown Fairbanks. UAF is then the home of UAF eCampus, which offers fully online programs.

In fall 2017, UAF enrolled 8,720 students. Of those students, 58% were female and 41% were male; 87.8% were undergraduates, and 12.2% were graduate students. As of May 2018, 1,352 students had graduated during the hastily preceding summer, fall and spring semesters.

Fairbanks (Lower Tanana: Tanan) is a house rule city and the borough seat of the Fairbanks North Star Borough in the U.S. state of Alaska.

Fairbanks is the largest city in the Interior region of Alaska. 2019 estimates put the population of the city proper at 30,917, and the population of the Fairbanks North Star Borough at 96,849, making it the second most populous metropolitan area in Alaska (after Anchorage). The Metropolitan Statistical Area encompasses whatever of the Fairbanks North Star Borough and is the northernmost Metropolitan Statistical Area in the United States, located 196 miles (315 kilometers) by road (140 mi or 230 km by air) south of the Arctic Circle. Fairbanks is house to the University of Alaska Fairbanks, the founding campus of the University of Alaska system.