Nearly 400 years ago, Boston began its long and storied history of becoming the great education mecca it is today. It has the largest proportion of resident college students of all major U.S. cities, with over 50 colleges and universities and over 250,000 students in the Greater Boston area.
Boston’s education past began in 1635 when Boston Latin (still in operation) opened as the first public school in the U.S. The next year saw the opening of the first college: Harvard University. The years following found openings for the first public library, first public school for African-American children, first college for women (Mount Holyoke – still in operation – in Western Massachusetts), first publically supported municipal library (1848), and the first woman in the United States to earn a PhD. (Helen Magill Clark).
Today, Massachusetts is home to 114 institutions of higher education, making the education sector one of the state’s largest employers and driver of significant economic growth. In the Boston-Cambridge-Newton metro area, 44.8% of the population has bachelor’s degrees. The city of Boston also attracts more international students than any other major U.S. city, including New York. The abundance of universities drives an innovative spirit, with start-up accelerators such as the MIT Media Lab and Harvard i-Lab fostering new ideas and turning them into real companies.
The Boston-area is home to seven of the top 50 colleges and universities: Harvard (#2), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (#5), Tufts University, Boston College, Brandeis University, Boston University, and Northeastern University. Plus, Massachusetts is home to five of the top 50 best liberal arts colleges: Williams College (#1), Amherst College (#2), Wellesley College (#3), Smith College, College of the Holy Cross, and Mount Holyoke College. These colleges and universities provide a wealth of expertise, in all areas of study, and are an excellent resource for speaker opportunities for events.
Source: U.S. News & World Report
To learn more about the education industry in Boston, check out our industry profile fact sheet in the Meeting Planner Toolkit. Or hear more Wicked Good Reasons to bring your event to Boston in the Boston section of our website.