How to spell university

hear itu·ni·ver·si·ty/,junə'vɜrsɪti/nounSilent and tricky

What it means: An institution for higher education and learning.

In a sentence: She wants to learn a lot when she goes to university.

The part people get wrong

Watch for an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as univercity or universaty.

Same family: universal, university-level, university student, university campus, universe. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: The word “university” comes from the Latin phrase “universitas magistrorum et scholarium,” meaning “a community of teachers and scholars.” One of the oldest universities in the world, the University of Bologna, was founded around the year 1088.

Patterns it uses: The unstressed vowel (schwa)

Try spelling it

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