Organization:University of Cologne

Short description: University in Germany

University of Cologne

Universität zu Köln
University seal of 1392
Latin: Universitas Coloniensis
Type	Public
Established	1388 (1388)
Academic affiliation	U15
Budget	€897.9 million
Rector	Joybrato Mukherjee
Academic staff	7,393
Students	50,792
Location	Cologne , North Rhine-Westphalia , Germany
Campus	Urban
Website	university.cologne

The University of Cologne (German: Universität zu Köln) is a university in Cologne, Germany. It was established in the year 1388, the sixth university to be established in Central Europe. It closed in 1798 before being re-established in 1919. It is now one of the largest universities in Germany with more than 50,000 students. The University of Cologne is a member of the German U15 association of major research-intensive universities and was a university of excellence as part of the German Universities Excellence Initiative from 2012 to 2019. It is constantly ranked among top 20 German universities in the world rankings.

University of Cologne has 4 Clusters of Excellence; CECAD Cluster of Excellence for Aging Research, Cluster of Excellence ECONtribute: Markets & Public Policy, CEPLAS Cluster of Excellence for Plant Sciences and Cluster of Excellence Matter and Light for Quantum Information (ML4Q). As of 2022, among its notable alumni, faculty and researchers are 4 Nobel Laureates, 11 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize winners, 7 Humboldt Professorship winners, 2 Humboldt Research Awards winners and 1 Rhodes Scholar.

History

First building of the new university

1388–1798

The university of Cologne was established in 1388 as the fourth university in the Holy Roman Empire, after the Charles University of Prague (1348), the University of Vienna (1365) and the Ruprecht Karl University of Heidelberg (1386). The charter was signed by Pope Urban VI. The university began teaching on 6 January 1389, and operated for several hundred years.

In 1798, the university was abolished by the French First Republic, who had invaded Cologne in 1794, because under the new French constitution, many universities were abolished all over France. The last rector Ferdinand Franz Wallraf was able to preserve the university's Great Seal, now once more in use.

1919–today

Main building, by architect Adolf Abel, 1934

In 1919, the Prussian government endorsed a decision by the Cologne City Council to re-establish the university. This was considered to be a replacement for the loss of the University of Strasbourg on the west bank of the Rhine, which contemporaneously reverted to France with the rest of Alsace. On 29 May 1919, the Cologne Mayor Konrad Adenauer signed the charter of the modern university.

At that point, the new university was located in Neustadt-Süd, but relocated to its current campus in Lindenthal on 2 November 1934. The old premises are now being used for the Cologne University of Applied Sciences.

Initially, the university was composed of the Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences (successor to the Institutes of Commerce and of Communal and Social Administration) and the Faculty of Medicine (successor to the Academy of Medicine). In 1920, the Faculty of Law and the Faculty of Arts were added, from which latter the School of Mathematics and Natural Sciences was split off in 1955 to form a separate Faculty. In 1980, the two Cologne departments of the Rhineland School of Education were attached to the university as the Faculties of Education and of Special Education. In 1988, the university became a founding member of the Community of European Management Schools and International Companies (CEMS), today's Global Alliance in Management Education.

The university is a leader in the area of economics and is regularly placed in top positions for law and business, both for national and international rankings.

Organization

University campus between main building and mensa (the university canteen)

The University of Cologne is a statutory corporation (Körperschaft des öffentlichen Rechts), operated by the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia.

Faculties

The university is divided into six faculties, which together offer 200 fields of study. The faculties are those of Management, Economics and Social Sciences, Law, Medicine (with the affiliated University clinic), Arts, Mathematics and Natural Sciences and Human Sciences.

Faculty	Students
Faculty of Management, Economics and Social Sciences	Template:Ca 10,000
Faculty of Law	Template:Ca 5,000
Faculty of Medicine with University Hospital of Cologne	Template:Ca 3,200
Faculty of Arts and Humanities	Template:Ca 16,500
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences	Template:Ca 7,500
Faculty of Human Sciences	Template:Ca 2,800

Rectors

Axel Freimuth, 2007

On 24 November 2004, the physicist Axel Freimuth was elected as Rector of the University. His (initially four-year) term began on 1 April 2005. He succeeded Tassilo Küpper and was the 49th Rector since 1919. He was previously Dean of Mathematics and Natural Sciences.

Academic profile

The University of Cologne is member of the association German U15 e.V. which is a coalition of fifteen major research-intensive and leading medical universities in Germany with a full disciplinary spectrum.

Especially the faculties of law and economics are renowned and leading in Germany. Leading researchers are affiliated to Cologne: e.g., Angelika Nußberger, Thomas von Danwitz, Claus Kreß, Martin Henssler, Ulrich Preis, Heinz-Peter Mansel.

Apart from these, affiliated persons with the university have won various awards including Max Planck Research Award, Cologne Innovation Prize (City of Cologne), Postbank Finance Award (Deutsche Postbank), Ernst Jung Prize in Medicine (Jung Foundation), SASTRA Ramanujan Prize, Wilhelm Vaillant Prize (Wilhlem Vaillant Foundation), Heinz Maier Leibnitz Prize (DFG), Alfried Krupp Prize for the Advancement of Young Professors, Innovation Prize of the State of NRW, Karl Arnold Prize (North Rhine-Westphalia Academy of Sciences and Arts).

Rankings

Template:Infobox Germany university rankings According to the QS World University Rankings, the university held the 268th position globally and the 17th position nationally in 2024. The Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2023 saw the university at the 160th place globally and 15th place at the national level. In the Academic Ranking of World Universities, more commonly known as the ARWU rankings, for the year 2022, the university was ranked within the 151-200 range globally and between 6th and 9th in the national ranking.

By subject

QS World University Rankings by Subject 2023

Subject	Global	National
Arts & Humanities	Template:Rise 156	Template:Fall 9–10
Linguistics	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Same position 4–10
Archaeology	Template:Same position 51–100	Template:Same position 6–8
Classics and Ancient History	Template:Rise 24	Template:Rise 5
English Language and Literature	Template:Same position 251–300	Template:Rise 10–12
History	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Same position 9–12
Modern Languages	Template:Fall 201–250	Template:Rise 10–13
Philosophy	Template:Rise 101–150	Template:Fall 8–12
Engineering and Technology	N/A	N/A
Life Sciences & Medicine	Template:Fall 185	Template:Rise 10
Biological Sciences	Template:Fall 144	Template:Fall 11
Medicine	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Rise 8–13
Psychology	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Same position 8–9
Natural Sciences	N/A	N/A
Geography	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Rise 8–10
Social Sciences & Management	Template:Rise 246	Template:Same position 9
Accounting and Finance	Template:Same position 201–250	Template:Rise 6–7
Anthropology	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Rise 6–7
Business and Management Studies	Template:Fall 251–300	Template:Fall 9
Communication and Media Studies	Template:New entry 201–250	Template:New entry 9–10
Economics and Econometrics	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Rise 5–8
Law and Legal Studies	Template:Same position 201–250	Template:Same position 9–12
Sociology	Template:Fall 151–200	Template:Fall 9–11

THE World University Rankings by Subject 2023

Subject	Global	National
Arts & humanities	Template:Fall 85	Template:Rise 7
Business & economics	Template:Rise 201–250	Template:Rise 10–14
Education	Template:Rise 151–175	Template:Same position 9–10
Law	Template:New entry 151–175	Template:New entry 7–8
Social sciences	Template:Fall 176–200	Template:Fall 9–13
Clinical & health	Template:Fall 201–250	Template:Fall 12–16
Life sciences	Template:Same position 101–125	Template:Same position 11–12
Physical sciences	Template:Same position 251–300	Template:Fall 22–26
Psychology	Template:Same position 126–150	Template:Fall 14–16

ARWU Global Ranking of Academic Subjects 2022

Subject	Global	National
Natural Sciences
Physics	Template:Same position 201–300	Template:Rise 13–23
Chemistry	Template:Same position 301–400	Template:Same position 26–30
Earth Sciences	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Fall 5–12
Geography	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Same position 8–13
Atmospheric Science	Template:Same position 151–200	Template:Rise 11–14
Engineering
Materials Science & Engineering	Template:Same position 401–500	Template:Rise 22–30
Biotechnology	Template:Same position 201–300	Template:Fall 14–25
Life Sciences
Biological Sciences	Template:Same position 76–100	Template:Fall 6–11
Human Biological Sciences	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Fall 13–20
Agricultural Sciences	Template:Fall 151–200	Template:Fall 9–18
Medical Sciences
Clinical Medicine	Template:Same position 201–300	Template:Same position 14–22
Public Health	Template:Same position 301–400	Template:Rise 12–22
Dentistry & Oral Sciences	Template:Same position 201–300	Template:Rise 22–28
Medical Technology	Template:Rise 51–75	Template:Fall 9–12
Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences	Template:Fall 301–400	Template:Fall 24–29
Social Sciences
Economics	Template:Fall 151–200	Template:Fall 6–8
Law	Template:Same position 201–300	Template:Fall 3–7
Political Sciences	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Same position 5–7
Sociology	Template:Rise 35	Template:Same position 1
Education	Template:Fall 201–300	Template:Fall 8–15
Communication	Template:Fall 151–200	Template:Rise 11–14
Psychology	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Rise 5–11
Business Administration	Template:Same position 101–150	Template:Same position 1–2
Management	Template:Fall 151–200	Template:Fall 2–3

Museums and collections

• GeoMuseum: The only natural history museum in Cologne
• Theatre Collection in Schloss Wahn: images and text from European theater from the 16th century
• Max Bruch Archive of the Institute of Musicology: autographs and writings from and about Max Bruch
• The Kathy Acker Reading Room, the personal library of author Kathy Acker.
• Musical Instrument Collection of the Musicology Institute
• Egyptian collection: Papyri and parchments, ceramics and small sculptures
• Prehistoric collection artefacts from all periods of prehistoric and early history also from foreign sites, from the Neanderthal fist to the bronze sword and iron weapons of the early Middle Ages
• Papyrus collection of the Institute of Antiquity
• Barbarastollen: Under the main building, a mining gallery was built as part of a museum for trade and industry in 1932

• 

  Main building (east view)

• 

  Building of the WiSo Faculty

• 

  Building of the Faculty of Philosophy

• 

  The building of the university and City Library of Cologne

• 

  The seminar building (built in 2009 by Paul Böhm )

• 

  Building of the Center for Organic Electronics (COPT)

Students and faculty

Campus of the Cologne University Hospital in Lindenthal

In 2005, the university enrolled 47,203 students, including 3,718 graduate students. In 2003, the number of post-doctoral researchers was 670.

There were 6,157 international students in the 2005 Summer Semester (approximately 13% of all students). Those from developing countries made up about 60%, representing a total of 123 nations. The largest contingents came from Bulgaria (10.5%), Russia (8.8%), Poland (7.4%), China (6.2%) and Ukraine (5.7%).

There are 508 professors at the university, including 70 women. In addition, the university employs 1,549 research assistants, with an additional 765 at the clinic, and 1,462 other assistants (3,736 at the clinic).

Partner universities

The University of Cologne maintains twenty official partnerships with universities from ten countries. Of these, the partnerships with Clermont-Ferrand I and Pennsylvania State are the oldest partnerships. In addition, Cologne has further cooperations with more than 260 other universities.

• Federal University of Ceará, Fortaleza, Brazil (since 1990)
• Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski, Sofia, Bulgaria (since 1985)
• Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China (since 2005)
• Fudan University, Shanghai, China (since 2010)
• Université d'Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand I, France (since 1962)
• Université Blaise Pascal, Clermont-Ferrand II, France (since 1980)
• Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece (since 1992)
• National Law School of India University, Bangalore, India
• Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, Japan (since 1987)
• Keio University, Tokyo, Japan (since 1981)
• University of Wrocław, Wrocław, Poland (since 2003)
• University of Rajshahi, Rajshahi, Bangladesh
• Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland (since 1990)
• Maxim Gorky Literature Institute, Moscow, Russia
• Volgograd State University, Russia (since 1993)
• University of Seville, Spain
• Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic (since 1999)
• Istanbul University, Istanbul, Turkey (since 2003)
• University of California at Berkeley, School of Law, Berkeley, CA, U.S.
• Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA, U.S. (since 2001)
• Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA, U.S. (since 1961)

Notable alumni and professors

Albertus Magnus monument in front of the main building

• Albertus Magnus
• Thomas Aquinas
• Kurt Alder (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1950)
• Eberhard Becker (Rector of University of Dortmund from 2002 to 2008)
• Peter Grünberg (Nobel Prize in Physics 2007)
• Heinrich Böll (Nobel Prize for Literature)
• Karl Carstens (president of the Federal Republic of Germany 1979–1984)
• Gustav Heinemann (president of the Federal Republic of Germany 1969 to 1974)
• Benjamin List (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2021)
• Karolos Papoulias (former president of the Hellenic Republic)
• Martin Broszat (1926–1989), historian
• Ute Deichmann, historian
• Erich Gutenberg (founder of modern German business studies)
• Amos Grunebaum, obstetrician and gynecologist
• Jenny Gusyk, a Jewish woman of Turkish citizenship, was the first female and foreign student to be enrolled in 1919.
• Sasa Hanten-Schmidt, lawyer and publicist
• Leonhard Harding, (born 1936), historian and scholar in African studies
• Hans Mayer (1907–2001), literary scholar
• Stephan Noller (born 1970), internet-entrepreneur, founder and former committee chairman
• Ernst Alfred Philippson (1900–1993), philologist
• Axel Ockenfels
• Katja Terlau (born 1970), art historian and provenance researcher
• Andreas Kaplan, German economist
• Eberhard Voit

In popular culture

The University of Cologne was commemorated on the Federal Republic of Germany's postage stamp in 1988, celebrating university's 600 years.

See also

• List of medieval universities

Further reading

• Meuthen, Erich (1988) (in de). Die alte Universität. Köln: Böhlau. ISBN 3-412-06287-1. OCLC 180392627. 
• Heimbüchel, Bernd (1988) (in de). Kölner Universitätsgeschichte / 2. Das 19. und 20. Jahrhundert.. Köln: Böhlau. ISBN 3-412-01588-1. OCLC 612668352. 
• (in de) Die neue Universität, Daten und Fakten.. Köln: Böhlau. 1988. ISBN 3-412-01688-8. OCLC 247418886. 
• Stam, David H. (2001). "Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek Köln". International dictionary of library histories. Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers. ISBN 1-57958-244-3. OCLC 46944624. 

External links

• Official website (in German and English)
• Absolventennetzwerk der Universität zu Köln (in German)