The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign (also known as U of I, Illinois, or colloquially as the University of Illinois or UIUC) is a public research university in the U.S. state of Illinois. Founded in 1867 as a land-grant institution in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana, it is the flagship campus of the University of Illinois system and a founding member of the Big Ten Conference. 

The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign is a member of the Association of American Universities and is classified as a R1 Doctoral Research University under the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, which denotes the highest research activity. In fiscal year 2015, total research expenditures at Illinois totaled $640 million. The campus library system possesses the second-largest university library in the United States after Harvard University. The university also hosts the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and is home to the fastest supercomputer on a university campus. 

The university comprises 17 colleges that offer more than 150 programs of study. The university holds 651 buildings on and its annual operating budget in 2016 was over $2 billion. The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign also operates a Research Park home to innovation centers for multinational corporations and publicly traded firms including Abbott, Caterpillar, Capital One, State Farm, and Yahoo, among others.
What group is it associated with?
 a founding member of the Big Ten Conference. 