The university began admitting women the following year. Billings, a trustee of the College of California, suggested that a new campus site north of Oakland be named in honor of Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkeley. Ten faculty members and 40 male students made up the fledgling university when it opened in Oakland in 1869.
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The Organic Act states that the "University shall have for its design, to provide instruction and thorough and complete education in all departments of science, literature and art, industrial and professional pursuits, and general education, and also special courses of instruction in preparation for the professions". Made possible by President Lincoln's signing of the Morrill Act in 1862, the University of California was founded in 1868 as the state's first land-grant university, inheriting the land and facilities of the private College of California and the federal-funding eligibility of a public agricultural, mining, and mechanical arts college. Main article: History of the University of California, Berkeley Founding
īerkeley's athletic teams, which compete as the California Golden Bears primarily in the Pac-12 Conference, have won 107 national championships, and its students and alumni have won 223 Olympic medals (including 121 gold medals).
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Berkeley is also known for political activism and the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s. It founded and maintains close relationships with three national laboratories at Berkeley, Livermore and Los Alamos, and has played a prominent role in many scientific advances, from the Manhattan Project and the discovery of 16 chemical elements to breakthroughs in computer science and genomics. A founding member of the Association of American Universities, Berkeley hosts many leading research institutes, including the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute and the Space Sciences Laboratory.