The colonial colleges are nine institutions of higher education chartered in the Thirteen Colonies before the founding of the United States of America during the American Revolution. These nine have long been considered together, notably since the survey of their origins in the 1907 The Cambridge History of English and American Literature.

Columbia University, officially Columbia University in the City of New York, is a private, Ivy League, research university in New York City, United States. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhattan, it is the oldest institution of higher education in New York and the fifth-oldest in the United States and is considered one of the most prestigious universities in the world.