The faculty's undergraduate system is composed of seven affiliated colleges: Innis, New, St. Michael's, Trinity, University, Victoria, and Woodsworth. With more than 31,000 undergraduate and 4,700 graduate students, the Faculty of Arts and Science makes up over one third of the university's student population as a whole.
The faculty is nearly as old as the university itself, beginning as the Faculty of Arts during the University of Toronto's inauguration in 1843. One of its affiliated colleges, Victoria College, predates the official opening of the university. The Faculty of Arts and Science represents over half of the student population on the St. George campus; it hosts 64 per cent of its undergraduates and about one third of graduates who pursue degrees in the humanities, social sciences and sciences. It has 800 professors who teach some 2,000 courses arranged in more than 400 undergraduate and 150 graduate programs hosted by 29 departments, 49 centres and institutes. Graduate programs are hosted by the faculty's academic units through the School of Graduate Studies and typically operate tri-campus, with some programs offered at any of the three University of Toronto campuses: St. George, Mississauga and Scarborough.
1853: University College was established, assuming responsibility for all teaching in Arts in the University; the University became an examining and degree-granting body.
1856: Construction of present University College building started, completed in 1859.
1881: St. Michael’s College became affiliated with the University; it became fully federated in 1910.
1887: Instruction at the University of Toronto began in fields other than arts and the sciences. University College became purely an Arts College.
1890: The east section of the University College building, including University Library, was gutted by a fire.
1892: Victoria College moved from Cobourg and federated with the University of Toronto.
1904: Trinity College federated with the University of Toronto.
1905: Part-time courses leading to the Bachelor of Arts degree were established.
2003: The University of Toronto at Mississauga (formerly Erindale College) became a separate Arts and Science division of the university.
Academics
Sidney Smith Hall in 2009
College system
Every undergraduate student in the Faculty of Arts and Science belongs to one of seven colleges on the St. George campus. These include the constituent colleges (Innis, New, University, and Woodsworth) and undergraduate colleges of the federated universities (St. Michael's, Trinity, and Victoria). The University of Toronto Scarborough (originally known as Scarborough College) was part of the faculty until it became a separate academic division in 1972. Likewise, the University of Toronto Mississauga (originally Erindale College) separated from the faculty in the 2002-03 academic year following significant growth in enrolment.
The faculty consists of 29 academic departments, 7 colleges, and 45 interdisciplinary centres, institutes and programs. Below is a list of departments in the faculty:
Department of Anthropology
David A. Dunlap Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics
Rotman Commerce (formerly Commerce) is an undergraduate business program on the St. George campus administered jointly by the Faculty of Arts and Science and the Rotman School of Management. The program's first graduating class was in 1924. In April 2008, the program was renamed as Rotman Commerce after a $2.5 million gift from Sandra and Joseph Rotman. Although the program name has changed, the B.Com. degree continues to be awarded by the Faculty of Arts and Science. There are three specializations for Rotman Commerce students: Accounting, Finance and Economics, or Management. Every student also completes the requirements for a minor in Economics. There are currently 3,200 students enrolled in Rotman Commerce.
Students have the freedom to take any course from the Faculty of Arts and Science, allowing them to include with their specialist, any additional major, or minor. Rotman Commerce has many international study opportunities for students. It has 24 partner universities. Every year, the University of Toronto Summer Abroad Program also offers full-year Rotman Commerce courses in other countries.
The University of Toronto has been previously ranked in the top 25 worldwide in economics faculty, placing 23rd and 18th during the years (1995–99) and (2004–08) respectively. In philosophy, it ranked 15th overall in the English-speaking world and 1st in Canada in the Philosophical Gourmet Report. It ranks among the top 10 in North America for sociology. In the 2010 Academic Ranking of World Universities, the University of Toronto placed first overall in Canada, and ranked 10th worldwide in computer science.
Admission statistics
For the 2012–2013 entrance year, Arts had an entry average of 86.6% and Science had an entry average of 88.8%. Rotman Commerce, a joint program with the Rotman School of Management, had an entry average of 91.7%. For professional and graduate studies, admission is competitive. For 2011–2012, programs such as public policy and global affairs accept about one-tenth of applicants, though they do not have standardized admissions test requirements. Doctoral-stream master's programs had an acceptance rate of 29.6%, while doctoral programs admitted 21.5% of applicants.
List of deans
The following is a list of deans of the Faculty of Arts and Science.
No.
Picture
Name
Took office
Left office
Dean of the Faculty of Arts (1844–1853; 1901–1960)
Stephen Cook (professor emeritus of computer science and mathematics, 1970–present) – recipient of the A.M. Turing Award for formalizing the notion of NP-completeness through Cook's theorem, considered one of the forefathers of computational complexity theory.
Northrop Frye (professor of English, 1939–91) – influential literary critic and literary theorist
Raquel Urtasun (professor of computer science, 2014–present) – researcher in the field of artificial intelligence and deep learning, co-founder of the Vector Institute.
Eric A. Havelock (professor, 1929–47) – classicist and co-originator of the Toronto school of communication theory.
