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.

History

The university was founded in 1817 by William I of the Netherlands, then King of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, and by his Minister of Education, Anton Reinhard Falck. The foundation of the university was the result of a long intellectual tradition which dates back to the origins of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège. Beginning in the eleventh century, the influence of the principality attracted students and prominent scientists and philosophers, such as Petrarch, to study in its libraries. The reputation of its medieval schools gave the city the reputation as a new Athens. A 17 March 1808 decree by Napoleon I concerning the organization of an imperial university indicated Liège as the site of a new academy to be composed of a Faculty of Arts and a Faculty of Science—the first university charter for Liège. Ultimately, Liège owes its university to William I of the Netherlands, who remembered the city's prestigious legacy of teaching and culture when he decided to establish a new university on Walloon soil. Nearly 200 years later, settled to some extent in the district of Liège, the University of Liège belongs to the French community of Belgium. The university is located at the edge of the river Meuse, in the center of the Island, the Latin Quarter of Liège. In 2009, the Agronomical University of Gembloux (FUSAGx), based in Gembloux, in the Province of Namur, integrated ULiège. It has adopted a new name for academics as well as research, namely Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech.

Chronology

Organisation

The rector of ULiège is Professor Anne-Sophie Nyssen, who succeeded Professor Pierre Wolper in 2022, becoming the first woman to hold this position. Anne Girin has been the university's Administrator since September 1, 2020. She replaced Laurent Despy and became the first woman to hold this position. The University of Liège counts: ULiège comprises 11 faculties:

Campus

Since the 1970s, ULiège's main campus has been the hill, a vast planned community campus located about ten kilometers south from the center of Liège. However, the university has kept its headquarters and many administrative facilities in the city centre, as well as the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, the Institutes of Zoology, Anatomy, the HEC Liège Management School and the newly incorporated Faculty of Architecture. The Gembloux Agro-Bio Tech campus and faculty are located in the city of Gembloux, Namur Province, and Faculty of Science Department of Environmental Science and Management is located in Arlon, Luxembourg Province. The university also owns a scientific research station in the Belgian High Fens since 1924, the STARESO oceanography station in Calvi, Corsica, France, a meteorological station and the Sphinx Observatory on the Jungfraujoch, Switzerland, since 1950 and research stations and observatories in Chile (SPECULOOS and TRAPPIST-South), Morocco and Tenerife, Spain (TRAPPIST-North).

Notable alumni

For full list, see University of Liège alumni.

Notable faculty

Honorary doctorate

Notes and references