Located in Flanders, Ghent University is the second largest Belgian university, consisting of 50,000 students and 9,000 staff members. The university also supports the Ghent University Library (including the famous Boekentoren) and the Ghent University Hospital, which is one of the biggest hospitals in Belgium. In addition to satellite campuses elsewhere in Flanders and a Global Campus in Songdo, South Korea, Ghent University maintains many inter-university partnerships and programs both inside and outside of Europe.
After the Belgian revolution of 1830, the newly formed Belgian state began to administer Ghent University. In 1930, UGent became the first Dutch-speaking university in Belgium. Previously, French (and, even earlier, Latin) had been the standard academic language in what was Université de Gand. In 1991, it was granted major autonomy and changed its name accordingly from State University of Ghent (Dutch: Rijksuniversiteit Gent, abbreviated as RUG) to its current designation.
History
Painting of the establishment of the State University of Ghent in 1817 when the city was under Dutch rule
Foundation in the 19th century
Ghent was one of the largest and most important cities of Europe in the medieval period.
The university in Ghent was opened on 9 October 1817, with JC van Rotterdam as the first rector. The foundation of universities in Ghent, Liege, and Leuven that year – by the Dutch King William I – was part of a larger policy to stimulate academic lag across the southern provinces of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands (which would later become Belgium).[citation needed] The original four faculties comprised Humanities (Letters), Law, Medicine, and Science, with the language of instruction being Latin. In the first year, it had 190 students and 16 professors.
In the wake of the Belgian Revolution, of 1830, the number of students declined, having peaked at 414. Although the faculties of humanities and science were dissolved from the university, they were restored five years later, in 1835. At this time, French also became the language of instruction, taking the place of Latin.
Ghent University played a role in the foundation of modern organic chemistry. Friedrich August Kekulé unraveled the structure of benzene at Ghent and Adolf von Baeyer (Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer), a student of August Kekulé, made contributions to organic chemistry.[citation needed]
In 1882, Sidonie Verhelst became the first female student at Ghent University, in science and pharmacology.[3]
2021 Boekentoren - Ghent University Library
Developments in the 20th century
In 1903, the Flemish politician Lodewijk De Raet led a successful campaign to begin instruction in Dutch, and the first courses were begun in 1906.[citation needed]
During World War I, Ghent University was initially closed due to hostilities and subsequently due to the refusal of the academic staff and the students to resume classes while Belgium was occupied. Moritz von Bissing, the German Governor-General of occupied Belgium sought to make the territory easier to govern by exploiting the pre-war linguistic division. The Flamenpolitik ("Policy regarding the Flemish people") was launched in 1916. The occupying German administration set up the first Dutch-speaking university in Belgium in Ghent under the name Vlaamsche Hoogeschool (Flemish Institute of Higher Learning). Pejoratively referred to as the Von Bissing University, the Vlaamsche Hoogeschoolwas founded in 1916 but was disestablished after the war and the University of Ghent resumed its activities with French as the sole medium of instruction. In 1923, Cabinet Minister Pierre Nolf put forward a motion to definitively establish the university as a Dutch-speaking university, and this was realized in 1930. August Vermeylen served as the first rector of a Dutch-language university in Belgium.[4]
In the Second World War, the German administration of the university attempted to create a German orientation, removing faculty members and installing loyal activists.
In the postwar period, Ghent University became a much larger institution, following the government policy of democratizing higher education in Flanders during the 1950s and 1960s. By 1953, there were more than 3,000 students, and by 1969 more than 11,500.
The number of faculties increased to eleven, starting with Applied Sciences in 1957. It was followed by Economics and Veterinary Medicine in 1968, Psychology and Pedagogy, as well as Bioengineering, in 1969, and Pharmaceutical Sciences.
In the 1960s, there were several student demonstrations at Ghent University, notably around the Blandijn site, which houses the Faculty of Arts & Philosophy.[5] The most severe of demonstrations took place in 1969 in the wake of May 1968.
Since the end of the Cold War
In 1991, the university officially changed its name from Rijksuniversiteit Gent (RUG) to Universiteit Gent (UGent), following an increased grant of autonomy by the government of the Flemish Community. The faculty of Politics and Social Sciences is the most recent addition, in 1992.
Ghent University had a program founded by Andre Vlerick in 1953, then called Centre for Productivity Studies and Research. The program later evolved into a separate school called Instituut Professor Vlerick voor Management. Later in 1999 together with KU Leuven, Ghent University established Vlerick Business School merging the two MBA programs of the universities, naming the newborn institute Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School. In 2006, the school rebranded itself as Vlerick Business School. KU Leuven and Ghent University are still the parent institutions of the business school where many of the school's professors teach also in Leuven or Ghent. Nevertheless, UGent still offer MBA programs even after the merger.[6][circular reference]
Beyond Europe, Ghent University conducts exchange programs on all six continents.[31] Frameworks include its campus in South Korea and its 3C Partnership.
Ghent is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the province of East Flanders, and the third largest in the country, after Brussels and Antwerp. It is a port and university city.
The Catholic University of Leuven or Louvain was founded in 1834 in Mechelen as the Catholic University of Belgium, and moved its seat to the town of Leuven in 1835, changing its name to Catholic University of Leuven. In 1968, it was split into two universities, the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and the Université catholique de Louvain, following tensions between the Dutch and French-speaking student bodies.
The Vrije Universiteit Brussel is a Dutch and English-speaking research university in Brussels, Belgium. It has four campuses: Brussels Humanities, Science and Engineering Campus, Brussels Health Campus, Brussels Technology Campus and Brussels Photonics Campus.
The Université libre de Bruxelles is a French-speaking research university in Brussels, Belgium. It has three campuses: the Solbosch campus, the Plaine campus and the Erasmus campus.
Nyenrode Business Universiteit is a Dutch business university and the only private higher education institution that has the university status in the Netherlands. Founded in 1946, it is located on a large estate in the town of Breukelen, between Amsterdam and Utrecht. The educational institution is named after the castle where the course is located: Nijenrode Castle. Nyenrode was founded under the name of the Netherlands Training Institute for Abroad by renowned private Dutch companies, including KLM, Shell, Unilever, Philips, and AkzoNobel, with the objective 'For Business, By Business'. The establishment was the result of an idea from KLM director Albert Plesman.
The University of Liège, or ULiège, is a major public university of the French Community of Belgium founded in 1817 and based in Liège, Wallonia, Belgium. Its official language is French.
Vlerick Business School ("Vlerick") is a Belgian business school with campuses in Ghent, Leuven, and Brussels. It is a result of a merger of MBA programmes of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and of the Instituut Professor Vlerick voor Management of Ghent University, in 1999. It is a higher education institute recognized and subsidized by decree.
The Institute of Philosophy is the faculty of philosophy at the KU Leuven in the Belgian city of Leuven. It was founded in 1968 when the Institut supérieur de Philosophie - Hoger Instituut voor Wijsbegeerte of the Catholic University of Leuven (1835–1968) was split into a Dutch-speaking entity and a French-speaking entity. Its main buildings are located in the center of Leuven at the Kardinaal Mercier Square, named for the founder of the original institute.
Science and technology in Flanders, being the Flemish Community and more specifically the northern region of Belgium (Europe), is well developed with the presence of several universities and research institutes. These are strongly spread over all Flemish cities, from Kortrijk and Bruges in the Western side, over Ghent as a major university center alongside Antwerp, Brussels and Leuven to Hasselt and Diepenbeek in the Eastern side.
André, Baron Vlerick was a Belgian politician, businessman, professor and founder of the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School. He graduated in economy at the University of Ghent and was appointed at the University of Leuven as well as the University of Ghent as Professor of Economics. He founded the department of regional economy at the University of Ghent. He is also the founder of Protea, a pro-apartheid Belgian organisation which assisted the South African apartheid government in money laundering and circumventing sanctions through Kredietbank. Vlerick's lobbying efforts extended to a pan-European formation called Eurosa. In addition to Protea in Belgium, there were “sister organisations” in Austria, Britain, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland and West Germany. Evidence collected from Vlerick's archive has established that Eurosa received direct funding from the apartheid government. A member of the Christian People's Party he was appointed during various Belgian Governments in the 1960s-1970s as Minister of the Flemish Regional Economy, actually till his appointment as Minister of Finance in 1972. He was also appointed after the war as the Administrator of the Marshall Plan for Belgium. He was instrumental in the post-war years of the successful Flemish economic development. André Vlerick was a son-in-law of Gustave Sap and the uncle of Philippe Vlerick.
The State University of Leuven was a university founded in 1817 in Leuven in Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. It was distinct from the Old University of Leuven (1425-1797) and from the Catholic University of Leuven, founded in 1834, which moved from Mechlin to Leuven after the State University had been closed in 1835.
KU Leuven is a Catholic research university in the city of Leuven, Belgium. Founded in 1425, it is the oldest university in Belgium and the oldest university in the Low Countries.
The Institut supérieur de Philosophie (ISP) is an independent research institute at the University of Louvain (UCLouvain) in Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. It is a separate entity to the UCLouvain School of Philosophy.
The Vlaamsche Hoogeschool, commonly referred to by its detractors as von Bissing university, was a Dutch-speaking university established at Ghent in German-occupied Belgium in October 1916. Distinct from the existing State University of Ghent, the University formed part of the German Flamenpolitik and was a response to the long-established grievance of the Flemish Movement which campaigned against Ghent University's curriculum being taught only in French, despite the university being located in Dutch-speaking Flanders. The institution took its informal name from Moritz von Bissing, the German Governor-General of Belgium from 1914 to 1917, who was himself one of the Flamenpolitik 's chief advocates.
Paul Jean Etienne Charles Marie Bergmans (1868–1935) was a librarian in chief of the University of Ghent, and musical historian.
Marcel Alfons Gilbert van Meerhaeghe was a Belgian economist, professor, publicist and columnist.
The Major Seminary in Ghent was an institution for the training of Catholic clergy for the diocese of Ghent, first founded in 1569. It has been established at three different locations in the city. Since 2006 diocesan clergy from Ghent have been trained in Leuven.
Emma Leclercq was a Belgian cell biologist and feminist lecturer. She was known for being the first female student and graduate from Université libre de Bruxelles, and the first female doctorate earner from Ghent University.
Andreas De Leenheer was a Belgian academic and biologist. He was Vice-Rector of Ghent University from 1997 to 2001 and Rector from 2001 to 2005.
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