Ahead of college orhead of house is the head or senior member of acollege within acollegiate university. The title used varies between colleges, includingdean,master,president,principal,provost,rector andwarden.^[1][2]

The role of the head of college varies significantly between colleges of the same university, and even more so between different universities. However, the head of college will often have responsibility for leading the governing body of the college, often acting as achair of various college committees; for executing the decisions of the governing body through the college's organisational structure, acting as achief executive; and for representing the college externally, both within the government of the university and further afield often in aid of fund-raising for the college.^[3] The nature of the role varies in importance depending on the nature of the central university. At a loosely federated university such as theUniversity of London or theNational University of Ireland, where each member institution is self-governing and some hold university status in their own right, the head of each institution has the same level of responsibility as thevice-chancellor of a university. At more centralised universities, the heads of colleges have less power and responsibility.

Heads of colleges will often participate in the governance of the central university. Mechanisms for this vary between university and include:

• The Collegiate Council at theUniversity of London, which advises the Board of Trustees and is responsible for academic affairs.^[4]
• The Conference of Colleges at theUniversity of Oxford,^[5] the chair of which and one other member sit on theuniversity council.^[6]
• Four places on the university council at theUniversity of Cambridge reserved for heads of colleges.^[7]
• Ex officio membership of thesenate for all heads of colleges atDurham University,^[8]Lancaster University^[9] and theUniversity of Roehampton.^[10]
• The Partnership Council at theUniversity of the Highlands and Islands.^[11]
• Joint appointments of heads of colleges as pro vice-chancellors and members of the university executive board atUniversity of the Arts London.^[12]

Many different titles are used for heads of colleges. These have also changed with time, in particularly the recent move away from usingmaster by colleges at Durham,^[13]Kent (where the position of head of college was abolished),^[14]Rice,^[15]Yale^[16] andHarvard^[17] universities. At theUniversity of York, the post of principal (head of college) was abolished in 2023, with the senior college fellow becoming the chair of the college council and operational powers delegated to the college manager.^[18]

In the case of some older colleges whose statutes are in Latin, the titles used in the modern era are English translations of those found in the statutes, e.g. "provost" forpraepositus, "president" forpraeses, and "warden" forcustos.

• Terminology of the University of Cambridge
• Terminology of the University of Oxford
• Terminology of Durham University
• Academic administrators
• University governance

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from April 2022
• Use British English from January 2023
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