This is a list of universities in North America. Universities in North America have an extensive history of being some of the leading educational institutions in the world. North American universities were originally modeled after universities in Europe but have developed different systems of their own. History A majority of universities started out as seminaries as part of missions to the new world. The Autonomous University of Santo Domingo, the oldest university in North America formed in 1538, is an example along with Université Laval, formed in 1663 in Canada. The precedent of founding universities out of seminaries is so strongly established in North America that even certain public universities were founded as seminaries, such as Indiana University which was founded in 1820 as State Seminary and had Protestant ministers as its presidents for its first six decades. The oldest university in the United States of America is Harvard, which was formed in 1636 (although the College of William and Mary gained official university status first). Lists by country *List of universities in Canada *List of universities in Cuba *List of universities in Mexico *List of colleges and universities in the United States