National and Kapodistrian University of Athens

National and Kapodistrian University of Athens

Εθνικό και Καποδιστριακό Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών
Seal of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
Latin: Universitas Atheniensis
Type	Public
Established	3 May 1837
Rector	Meletios–Athanassios Dimopoulos
Academic staff	1,964
Administrative staff	1,316
Students	105,000 (2015) [1]
Location	Zografou , Greece
Campus	Urban, suburban
Newspaper	To Kapodistriako
Colours	Blue and White
Website	Official website (in English)

The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA; Greek: Εθνικό και Καποδιστριακό Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών, Ethnikó ke Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón), ^[a] usually referred to simply as the University of Athens (UoA), is a public university in Zografou, Athens, Greece.^{[1] [2]}

It has been in continuous operation since its establishment in 1837 and is the oldest higher education institution of the modern Greek state and the first contemporary university in the Eastern Mediterranean. Today it is one of the largest universities by enrollment in Europe, with over 100,000 registered students.^{[2] [3]}

The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) is an integral part of the modern Greek academic and intellectual tradition.^{[4] [5] [6]}

History[edit]

Founding and expansion[edit]

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The University of Athens was founded on May 3, 1837, by King Otto of Greece (in Greek, Othon) and was named in his honour Othonian University (Οθώνιον Πανεπιστήμιον). It was the first university in the liberated Greek state and in the surrounding area of Southeast Europe as well. It was also the second academic institution after the Ionian Academy. This fledgling university consisted of four faculties; Theology, Law, Medicine and Arts (which included applied sciences and mathematics). During its first year of operation, the institution was staffed by 33 professors, while courses were attended by 52 students and 75 non-matriculated "auditors".

The 19th-century University of Athens historic building designed by Christian Hansen, as seen in 2014. It was once the only University building but now serves as a ceremony hall and rectory.

It was first housed in the residence of architects Stamatios Kleanthis and Eduard Schaubert, on the north slope of the Acropolis, in Plaka, which now houses the Museum of the University. In November 1841 the university relocated on the Central Building of the University of Athens, a building designed by Danish architect Christian Hansen. He followed a neoclassical approach, "combining the monument's magnificence with a human scale simplicity" and gave the building its H-shape.^[7] The building was decorated by painter Carl Rahl, forming the famous "architectural trilogy of Athens", together with the building of the National Library of Greece (left of the university) and the building of the Athens Academy (right of the university). Construction began in 1839 in a location to the north of the Acropolis. Its front wing, also known as the Propylaea, was completed in 1842–1843. The rest of the wings' construction, that was supervised at first by Greek architect Lysandros Kaftantzoglou and later by his colleague Anastasios Theofilas, was completed in 1864. The building is nowadays part of what is called the "Athenian Neoclassical Trilogy".^[7]

The Othonian University was renamed to National University (Εθνικόν Πανεπιστήμιον) in 1862, following events that forced King Otto to leave the country. It was later renamed to "National and Kapodistrian University of Athens" to honour Ioannis Kapodistrias, the first head of state of the independent modern Greek state.

A major change in the structure of the University came about in 1904, when the faculty of Arts was divided into two separate faculties: that of Arts (Σχολή Τεχνών) and that of Sciences (Σχολή Επιστημών), the latter consisting of the departments of Physics and Mathematics and the School of Pharmacy. In 1919, a department of chemistry was added, and in 1922 the School of Pharmacy was renamed a Department. A further change came about when the School of Dentistry was added to the faculty of medicine.

Between 1895 and 1911, an average of 1,000 new students matriculated each year, a number which increased to 2,000 at the end of World War I. This resulted in the decision to introduce entrance examinations for all the faculties, beginning for the academic year 1927–28. Since 1954 the number of students admitted each year has been fixed by the Ministry of Education and Religion, by proposal of the faculties.

Modern history[edit]

From 1911 until 1932 the university was separated into the Kapodistrian University (the humanities departments; named after Ioannis Kapodistrias) and the National University (the science departments). In 1932, the two separate legal entities were merged into the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.

During the 1960s construction work began on the University Campus in the suburb of Ilissia, which houses the Schools of Philosophy, Theology and Sciences.^[8]

In 2013, the University Senate made the decision to suspend all operations in the wake of the Ministry of Education and Religious Affairs cutting 1,655 administrative jobs from universities around the country. In a statement, the University Senate said that "any educational, research and administrative operation of the University of Athens is objectively impossible".^[9][10]

Faculties and departments[edit]

The University of Athens is divided into schools, faculties and departments as follows. The naming is nοt consistent in English for historical reasons, but in Greek the largest divisions are generally named "σχολές" (schools) and are divided in "τμήματα" (departments), furthermore subdivided in "τομείς" (faculties).^[11]

The Faculty of Law. The building was initially built about 1930. A second branch was added in the 1960s. Extensive renovation began in 2002 and was completed by 2006.^[12]

Academic evaluation[edit]

The University is ranked 501st-600th in The Times Higher Education (THE) annual list.^[4]

The University Club building, founded in 1927. The building houses the Health Services Office, the Meals Department, the University Club reading rooms, and the Students' Cultural Society (POFPA).^[15][16]

In 2015 the external evaluation of the institution cited University of Athens as Worthy of merit.^[17]

An external evaluation of all academic departments in Greek universities will be conducted by the Hellenic Quality Assurance and Accreditation Agency (HQAA) in the following years.^[18]

• School of Theology
  • Department of Theology (2013)^[19]
  • Department of Social Theology (2013)^[20]
• School of Philosophy
  • Department of History and Archaeology (2010)^[21]
  • Department of Philology (2013)^[22]
  • Department of Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology (2013)^[23]
  • Department of English Language and Literature (2011)^[24]
  • Department of French Language and Literature (2010)^[25]
  • Department of German Language and Literature (2014)^[26]
  • Department of Spanish Language and Literature (2013)^[27]
  • Department of Italian Language and Literature (2014)^[28]
  • Department of Theatre Studies (2014)^[29]
  • Department of Music Studies (2014)^[30]
• School of Law
  • Department of Law (2013)^[31]
• School of Sciences
  • Department of Mathematics (2012)^[32]
  • Department of Physics (2013)^[33]
  • Department of Chemistry (2012)^[34]
  • Department of Biology (2013) ^[35]
  • Department of Geology and Geoenvironment (2012)^[36]
  • Department of Informatics and Telecommunications (2011)^[37]
  • Department of Methodology, History and Theory of Science (2010)^[38]
• School of Health Sciences
  • Department of Medicine (2014)^[39]
  • Department of Medicine – Postgraduate Programmes (2014)^[40]
  • Department of Pharmacy (2013)^[41]
  • Department of Dentistry (2010)^[42]
  • Department of Nursing (2011)^[43]
• School of Economics and Political Sciences
  • Department of Economics (2014)^[44]
  • Department of Political Science and Public Administration (2014)^[45]
  • Department of Communication and Mass Media (2014)^[46]
  • Department of Turkish and Modern Asian Studies (2014)^[47]
• School of Education
  • Department of Primary Education (2013)^[48]
  • Department of Early Childhood Education (2013)^[49]
  • Department of Physical Education and Sports Science (2013)^[50]

Campuses[edit]

Ano Ilisia University campus

The Physics department building at the Ano Ilisia campus

The main campus is at Ano Ilisia (Zografou). There the faculties of Science, Theology and Philosophy are situated. The faculty of Life Sciences is located at Goudi and the faculty of Physical Education and Sports Science is located at Dafni. The faculties of Media, Education, Economics, Law and Public Administration are housed in various buildings near the centre of Athens, along with various administration facilities. University administration was housed initially in a historical neoclassical building near the center of Athens on Panepistimiou Street, but was relocated at the main university campus later.

Campus location	Schools	Independent faculties
Ano Ilisia	School of Science
	School of Theology
	School of Philosophy
		Faculty of Methodology, History and Theory of Science
Goudi	School of Health Sciences
Centre of Athens	School of Law, Economics and Political Sciences
		Faculty of Communication and Mass Media Studies
		Faculty of Primary Education
		Faculty of Early Childhood Education
	Faculty of Slavic Studies
	Faculty of Turkish and Modern Asian Studies
Dafni		Faculty of Physical Education and Sport Science

Research[edit]

Research in the University of Athens includes almost all research interests. Such research in the university is associated with that conducted by the hospitals and research institutes of the metropolitan area, including the National Research Center for Physical Sciences Demokritos, the National Research Foundation (EIE), the National Observatory of Athens, the Hellenic Pasteur Institute, the Alexander Fleming Biomedical Sciences Research Center, the Athens High Performance Computing Laboratory, the National Centre for Marine Research (NCMR) and the Foundation for Biomedical Research of the Academy of Athens (BRFAA).

Research conducted in the institutes of the metropolitan area of Athens accounted for more than 50% of the ISI-indexed scientific publications coming from Greece.^{[51] [52] [53]} The Department of Informatics and Telecommunications has been ranked continuously among the 100 most important research institutes in the field of Computer Science, according to Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU).^[6]

Notable alumni[edit]

Throughout its history, a sizeable number of University of Athens alumni have become notable in many varied fields, both academic and otherwise. Moreover, 2 Nobel prize-winners have studied or taught at Athens, with both their prizes being in Literature.

Politics[edit]

Political leaders who attended the University of Athens

Eleftherios Venizelos

Konstantinos Karamanlis

Andreas Papandreou

Nicos Anastasiades

Fifteen Greek prime ministers and three Greek presidents (Konstantinos Karamanlis served as both) have studied at the University of Athens, including Charilaos Trikoupis, Eleftherios Venizelos, Georgios Papandreou, Andreas Papandreou, Konstantinos Karamanlis, Karolos Papoulias, and most recently interim prime minister Vassiliki Thanou-Christophilou. Also, Constantine II, the last monarch of Greece, and Nicos Anastasiades, the current president of Cyprus, attended the university.

The University of Athens has also been home to a large number of other politicians, who were primarily Greek or Cypriot, such as Dora Bakoyannis, Kyriakos Mavronikolas, Georgios Alogoskoufis and Fofi Gennimata.

Science[edit]

• Gerasimos Danilatos, physicist, inventor of the ESEM
• Sophia Frangou, psychiatrist
• John P. A. Ioannidis (DSc, 1996 and MD 1990), professor and medical researcher^[54]
• Fotis Kafatos, biologist
• Michael N. Katehakis, applied mathematics and operations research
• Nikos Logothetis, neuroscientist
• Evangelos Moudrianakis, biologist
• Dimitri Nanopoulos, physicist
• Costas Soukoulis, physicist
• Georgios Papanikolaou, doctor, inventor of the Pap test
• Panayotis Varotsos, physicist
• Dimitrios Trichopoulos, cancer epidemiologist

Literature and philosophy[edit]

• Giorgios Seferis, Nobel laureate (1963), poet^[55]
• Odysseas Elytis, Nobel laureate (1979), poet^[56]
• Cornelius Castoriadis
• Nikos Kazantzakis
• Emmanuel Kriaras
• Helene Ahrweiler
• Christos Kalpakidis
• Dimitra Fimi

Religion[edit]

• Saint Nectarios of Aegina
• Ieronymos I of Athens, Archbishop of Athens and All Greece
• Anastasios of Albania, Archbishop of Albania
• Demetrios Trakatellis, Archbishop of America

Other[edit]

• Apostolos Santas
• George Lucas Adamopoulos, founder of the only school in the Philippines founded by Greeks, Adamson University in Manila
• Panagiotis Pikrammenos, judge and caretaker prime minister

See also[edit]

• List of universities in Greece
• List of research institutes in Greece
• List of University of Athens alumni
• Athens University Museum
• Education in Greece
• Open access in Greece
• List of modern universities in Europe (1801–1945)

Notes[edit]

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