University of the People

Education Services / Research

University of the People (UoPeople) is the Education Revolution. We are the first non-profit, tuition-free, American, accredited, online university. Dedicated to opening access to higher education globally, UoPeople is designed to help qualified high school graduates overcome financial, geographic, political, and personal constraints keeping them from collegiate studies. UNESCO estimates that by the year 2025, there will be nearly 100 million young people seeking seats in universities that don’t exist. UoPeople believes that access to higher education is a basic right which promotes world peace and global economic development.
The University offers associate and bachelor’s degree programs in Business Administration, Computer Science, and Health Science as well as master’s degree programs in Business Administration and Education. UoPeople was founded in 2009 and accredited in February 2014. University of the People in Arabic was launched in 2020, offering an Associate Degree in Business Administration, while at the same providing Arabic-speaking students intensive English-language courses. Today, there are more than 100,000 students from more than 200 countries and territories. Over 6,000 of these students are refugees.
UoPeople is staffed by thousands of volunteers, including its Founder and President, Shai Reshef, the distinguished members of its international boards of trustees and advisors, and its faculty. The President’s Council is chaired by John Sexton, NYU’s President Emeritus, and consists of two dozen other leaders from the world’s foremost institutions. More than 26,000 professionals have volunteered for leadership roles, serving as provost, as deans, as administrators, or as faculty.
UoPeople has collaborations with the University of Edinburgh, Effat University, Long Island University, McGill University and NYU. Each of these schools has used UoPeople to identify talented students to whom they have provided admission and generous financial aid. UoPeople not only provides its students with a quality degree but also provides them a way to demonstrate their talent and readiness for spots in the student bodies of the world’s leading universities. In addition, UoPeople has partnered with Harvard Business School Online to allow UoPeople students to participate in Harvard’s online courses. Upon graduation, 92% of those who receive degrees of any kind at UoPeople are employed, including at companies such as Amazon, Apple, Dell, Deloitte, IBM, Microsoft, and JP Morgan, and organizations such as the UN and the World Bank.
UoPeople is supported by the generosity of individuals and foundations, including the Gates, Hewlett, and Ford Foundations, Fondation Hoffmann, and others. The University has been covered by the New York Times, BBC, NPR, Times Higher Education, US News and World Report, and more. President Reshef’s TED Talk and Nas Daily interview about the University have 30 million views combined.