Simon Fraser University (SFU) may be a public research university in British Columbia, Canada, with three campuses: Burnaby (main campus), Surrey, and Vancouver. The 170-hectare (420-acre) main Burnaby campus on Burnaby Mountain, located 20 kilometres (12 mi) from downtown Vancouver, was established in 1965 and comprises over 30,000 students and 160,000 alumni. The university was created in an attempt to expand educational activity across Canada.
SFU could be a member of multiple national and international instruction, including the Association of Commonwealth Universities, International Association of Universities, and Universities Canada. SFU has also partnered with other universities and agencies to control joint research facilities like the TRIUMF, Canada's national laboratory for particle and natural philosophy, which houses the world's largest cyclotron, and Bamfield Marine Station, a significant centre for teaching and research in marine biology.
Undergraduate and graduate programs at SFU operate a year-round, three-semester schedule. Consistently ranked as Canada's top comprehensive university and named to the days educational activity list of 100 world universities under 50, SFU is additionally the primary Canadian member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, the world's largest college sports association. In 2015, SFU became the second Canadian university to receive accreditation from the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. SFU faculty and alumni have won 43 fellowships to the academy of Canada, three Rhodes Scholarships and one Pulitzer Prize. Among the list of alumni includes two former premiers of British Columbia, Gordon Campbell and Ujjal Dosanjh, owner of the Vancouver Canucks NHL team, Francesco Aquilini, Prime Minister of Lesotho, Pakalitha Mosisili, director at the Planck Institute, Robert Turner, and humanitarian and cancer research activist, Terry Fox.