Year on beer at university (4)
I believe the answer is:
yale
'university' is the definition.
(I know that Yale is a university)
'year on beer' is the wordplay.
'year' becomes 'y'.
'on' means one lot of letters go next to another (in a down clue, letters appear on others).
'beer' becomes 'ale' (type of beer).
'y'+'ale'='YALE'
'at' acts as a link.
(Other definitions for yale that I've seen before include "Heraldic animal" , "University; lock type" , "member of College League" , "Member of the 11 - type of lock" , "American university or kind of lock" .)