Founded in 1893, the University of Montana (UM) is a public research university situated in Missoula, Montana’s second-largest city.

Spanning 56 acres in the western portion of the state, the university has several campuses in Missoula, as well as in Helena, Butte and Dillon.

Its main Missoula campus is located at the base of Mount Sentinel along the Clark Fork River. It features over 60 architecturally important buildings, parkland and a 25,000+ seat football stadium. While UM’s South Campus offers student housing, soccer fields, a golf course and outdoor track facilities on a 180-acre site

Home to approximately 15,000 students, UM and Missoula College, which runs programmes in occupational and technical subjects, offers a wide range of courses, including liberal arts, graduate and postdoctoral study, and professional training.

Known as ‘a city within a city’, the university’s grounds gives students access to their own restaurants, medical facilities, postal services, banks, and even a police department.

The university counts a number of recognisable names among its alumni, including Jeannette Pickering Rankin, who in 1916 became the first woman to hold a high office in the US government, as well as the award-winning actor JK Simmons.

As the fourth largest state in the nation, Montana itself is renowned for its striking scenery, vast National Parks (including Yellowstone), glaciers, mountains and abundant wildlife. Rolling Stone magazine once described UM as having ‘the most scenic campus in America’.

In addition to a wide range of outdoor pursuits, UM also offers students athletics matches and art exhibitions on campus, as well as a wide range of public events.

The campus itself is well known for its life-size statue of a grizzly bear created by the sculptor and UM professor, Rudy Autio, in 1969 that stands seven feet tall and weighs 5000 pounds.

UM’s athletics teams are known as the Grizzlies. Their mascot is Monte (short for Montana) the bear, who shows up at football games and undertakes charitable works in the community.