The University of Peshawar (د پېښور پوهنتون; پشور یونیورسٹی; ; abbreviated UoP; known more popularly as Peshawar University) is a public research university located in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. The university is one of the oldest universities in the province, and is ranked as one of the highest rated universities in the country. The university was founded in 1950 and offers programs for undergraduate, post-graduate, and doctoral studies. With approximately 14,000 enrolled students attending the university, it has six academic faculties with forty postgraduate department as well as two "centers of excellence". The university is known for its research in social, medical, and natural sciences having eight research centers located inside the campus. Spread over an area of as a residential campus, the university is the first public university to be established in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In its inaugural year, it had an enrollment of 129, of whom one was a woman. The university was founded as an expansion of the Islamia College. The founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who had visited the college in 1928 had great admiration for it, referring to it as ‘my college’ and adopted it as one of the three heirs to his fortune, along with Aligarh University and Sindh Madrassa (his own school) in 1939. For Jinnah the university was a gift to students of the province, in recognition of the part played by them in the making of Pakistan, and how it was the Pashtuns who had fought the Indians and captured Azad Kashmir. University of Peshawar is a recognized university by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan.This university awards both undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. University of Peshawar has many departments including: Arts & Humanities Business & Social Sciences Language & Cultural Medicine & Health Science & Technology. Pashto Academy The department was established in 1982, housed at the Centre of Excellence in Physical Chemistry. After a period of two years, it was shifted to the newly constructed building of the present location.