Connecticut is famous as the home of Yale University – a member of the prestigious Ivy League and ranked 7th in the 2012/13 QS World University Rankings.
Like much of New England, it’s also well-known for its absolutely stunning and varied autumnal leaf colours – throughout September and October, visitors come from far and wide to witness the veritable kaleidoscope of colours on show.
Nestled between New York and Massachusetts on the north-east coast, Connecticut is the US’s third smallest state and its fourth most densely populated.
Much of the south east of the state is connected with the New York City metropolitan zone. However, if you’re studying abroad in Connecticut you’re more likely to spend your time hanging out in the atmospheric cities of Hartford, Bridgeport and New Haven, or checking out some of the state’s stunning natural scenery: the 250-mile Long Island Sound shoreline, the Lichfield Hills and the Connecticut River Valley.
Yale University is based in New Haven, Connecticut’s second-largest city after Bridgeport. As well as being a working port, New Haven also has a strong service sector – including health care, finance, law, engineering and retail.
Overall, service industries constitute the bulk of Connecticut’s economy, with particularly significant contributions from the finance, insurance and real sectors.
Connecticut: Fast facts
• Located in north-east of US; borders with New York, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and the Long Island Sound
• Capital is Hartford and largest city is Bridgeport
• Connecticut has 14 companies in 2012’s Fortune 500 list, including General Electric, United Technologies and Xerox
• According to a 2012 survey by online women’s community iVillage, Connecticut is the best state for women
• Famous alumni of Yale University include actress Meryl Streep, economist Paul Krugman, and politicians George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton
• New Haven is known for its excellent pizzerias
• Connecticut’s beautiful fall foliage is best viewed in September and October; during the viewing season state foresters publish regular colour reports
Top universities in Connecticut
As mentioned above, Yale University, in New Haven, is ranked 7th in the 2012/13 QS World University Rankings. One of the members of the prestigious Ivy League, Yale is well known worldwide, and – unsurprisingly – is extremely competitive.
The University of Connecticut, while not as well-known as Yale, is considered to be a ‘Public Ivy’ university - a term coined to refer to state-sector colleges capable of offering a comparable experience to the eight private universities included in the Ivy League.
‘UConn’, as it is known, has its main campus at Storrs, an area of the small town of Mansfield. As of the 2011/12 academic year, UConn has about 30,500 students in total, of which almost 22,500 are undergraduates.
Most are at the main Storrs campus, but UConn also has branches elsewhere in the state – notably Schools of Law and Social Work in Greater Hartford, and Schools of Medicine and Dentistry in Farmington.
More states on the north-east coast:
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