SYDNEY, NSW. — The University of Sydney is Australia’s oldest university. Located in Sydney’s inner city, the university has expanded to establish a number of campuses around Sydney, as well as the One Tree Island Research Station on the Great Barrier Reef.
The University of Sydney’s progressive ideas were due largely to the influence of statesman William Charles Wentworth.
Wentworth believed that students should be admitted based on their academic aptitude, rather than class or religion, as was the case in England.
Born to a convict woman on the Second Fleet, Wentworth was educated in England, as his father was Dr D’Arcy Wentworth, whose patron and kinsman was Lord Fitzwilliam. William Wentworth understood the limitations of a society based on class.
As a “Currency Lad”, one of the first children born into the colony of New South Wales, Wentworth enjoyed his status as different from the “English ascendancy,” and was an outspoken nationalist, determined to gain civil rights for those who, like himself, were very much in the minority.
As well as being a leading figure in the establishment of the first university in any of the colonies of Australia and Oceania, Wentworth was also instrumental in establishing the first real system of state primary education in New South Wales.
Founded on October 1, 1850, The University of Sydney opened its doors to students in 1852, and the first degrees were awarded in 1856.
In 1881, it became one of the first universities in the world to allow women to enrol.
