University of Bologna


The University of Bologna is a public research university in Bologna, Italy. It is the oldest university in continuous operation in the world, and the first degree-awarding institution of higher learning. Teaching began around 1088, with the university becoming organised as universitas scholarium or guilds of students by the late 12th century. The university's emblem carries the motto Alma Mater Studiorum and the date A.D. 1088. With over 90,000 students, the University of Bologna is one of the largest universities in Europe.
The university saw the first woman to earn a university degree and teach at a university, and the first woman to earn both a doctorate in science and a salaried position as a university professor. The University of Bologna had a central role in the sciences during the medieval age and the Italian renaissance, when it housed and educated Nicholas Copernicus in addition to numerous other renaissance mathematicians. It has educated a wide range of notable alumni, amongst them a large number of Italian scientists, prime ministers, supreme court judges and priests.
Aside from its main campus in Bologna, the university has additional campuses in Cesena, Forlì, Ravenna and Rimini, as well as branches abroad in Buenos Aires, New York, Brussels and Shanghai. It houses the fully funded boarding college Collegio Superiore di Bologna, the Bologna School of Advanced Studies, the botanical gardens of Bologna, a large number of museums, libraries and archeological collections, as well as the Bologna University Press.
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History

The date of the University of Bologna's founding is uncertain. The university was granted a charter by Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa in 1158, but in the 19th century, a committee of historians led by Giosuè Carducci traced the founding of the university back to 1088, which would make it the oldest continuously operating university in the world. However, the development of the institution at Bologna into a university was a gradual process. Paul Grendler writes that "it is not likely that enough instruction and organization existed to merit the term university before the 1150s, and it might not have happened before the 1180s."
The university arose around mutual aid societies of foreign students called "nations" for protection against city laws which imposed collective punishment on foreigners for the crimes and debts of their countrymen. These students then hired scholars from the city's pre-existing lay and ecclesiastical schools to teach them subjects such as liberal arts, notarial law, theology, and ars dictaminis. The lectures were given in informal schools called scholae. In time the various universitates scholarium decided to form a larger association, or Studium—thus, the university. The Studium grew to have a strong position of collective bargaining with the city, since by then it derived significant revenue through visiting foreign students, who would depart if they were not well treated. The foreign students in Bologna received greater rights, and collective punishment was ended. There was also collective bargaining with the scholars who served as professors at the university. By the initiation or threat of a student strike, the students could enforce their demands as to the content of courses and the pay professors would receive. University professors were hired, fired, and had their pay determined by an elected council of two representatives from every student "nation" which governed the institution, with the most important decisions requiring a majority vote from all the students to ratify. The professors could also be fined if they failed to finish classes on time, or complete course material by the end of the semester. A student committee, the "Denouncers of Professors", kept tabs on them and reported any misbehavior. Professors themselves were not powerless, however, forming collegia doctorum in each faculty, and securing the rights to set examination fees and degree requirements. Eventually, the city ended this arrangement, paying professors from tax revenues and making it a chartered public university.
The university is historically notable for its teaching of canon and civil law; indeed, it was set up in large part with the aim of studying the Digest, a central text in Roman law, which had been rediscovered in Italy in 1070, and the university was central in the development of medieval Roman law. Until modern times, the only degree granted at that university was the doctorate.
Bettisia Gozzadini earned a law degree in 1237, being one of the first women in history to obtain a university degree. She taught law from her own home for two years, and in 1239 she taught at the university, becoming the first woman in history to teach at a university.
In 1477, when Pope Sixtus IV issued a papal bull, authorizing the creation of Uppsala University in Sweden, the bull specified that the new university would have the same freedoms and privileges as the University of Bologna—a highly desirable situation for the Swedish scholars. This included the right of Uppsala to establish the four traditional faculties of theology, law, medicine, and philosophy, and to award the bachelor's, master's, licentiate, and doctoral degrees.
In 1711, Luigi Ferdinando Marsili convinced Pope Clement XI to provide funds to establish the Observatory of Bologna, the first public astronomical observatory in Italy. It was a center for research by astronomers such as Eustachio Manfredi, Giovanni Battista Guglielmini, and Eustachio Zanotti in the 18th century, and physicists like Guido Horn d'Arturo and Luigi Giuseppe Jacchia in the 20th century.
Laura Bassi was born into a prosperous family of Bologna and was privately educated from the age of five. Bassi's education and intellect was noticed by Prospero Lorenzini Lambertini, who became the Archbishop of Bologna in 1731. Lambertini became the official patron of Bassi. He arranged for a public debate between Bassi and four professors from the University of Bologna on 17 April 1732. In 1732, Bassi, aged twenty, publicly defended her forty-nine theses on Philosophica Studia at the Sala degli Anziani of the Palazzo Pubblico. The University of Bologna awarded her a doctorate degree on 12 May. She became the first woman to receive a doctorate in science, and the second woman in the world to earn a philosophy doctorate after Elena Cornaro Piscopia in 1678, fifty-four years prior. She was by then popularly known as Bolognese Minerva. On 29 October 1732, the Senate and the University of Bologna granted Bassi's candidature, and in December she was appointed professor of natural philosophy to teach physics. She became the first salaried woman lecturer in the world, thus beginning her academic career. She was also the first woman member of any scientific establishment, when she was elected to the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna in 1732. Bassi became the most important populariser of Newtonian mechanics in Italy.
In 1971, the Hellenist Benedetto Marzullo in company with Umberto Eco, Renato Barilli, Adelio Ferrero. instituted within the Faculty of Letters and Arts the DAMS. It was the first degree course of this type to be opened in Italy. Between December 26, 1982, and November 29, 1983, there occurred the DAMS murders, dealing with four victims who were students or professors of the DAMS: Angelo Fabbri, Liviana Rossi, the dancer Francesca Alinovi, and Leonarda Polvani.

Organization

Higher education processes are being harmonised across the European Community. Nowadays the university offers 101 different "Laurea" or "Laurea breve" first-level degrees, followed by 108 "Laurea specialistica" or "Laurea magistrale" second-level degrees. However 11 other courses have maintained the previous rules of "Laurea specialistica a ciclo unico" or "Laurea magistrale a ciclo unico", with only one cycle of study of five years, except for medicine and dentistry, which require six years of courses. After the "Laurea" one may attain first-level Master. After second-level degrees are attained, one may proceed to second-level Master, specialisation schools or research doctorates.
The 11 Schools are:
The university is structured in 33 departments, organized by homogeneous research domains that integrate activities related to one or more faculty. A new department of Latin history was added in 2015.
The 33 departments are:

Affiliates and other institutions

Il Mulino

In the early 1950s, some students of the University of Bologna were among the founders of the review "il Mulino". On 25 April 1951 the first issue of the review was published in Bologna. In a short time, "il Mulino" became one of the most interesting reference points in Italy for the political and cultural debate and established important editorial relationships in Italy and abroad. Editorial activities evolved along with the review. In 1954, the il Mulino publishing house was founded, which today represents one of the most relevant Italian publishers. In addition to this were initiated research projects, that eventually led, in 1964, to the establishment of the Istituto Carlo Cattaneo.

Collegio Superiore

The Collegio Superiore is an excellence institution inside the University of Bologna, aimed at promoting students' merit through dedicated learning programmes.
The institution was founded in 1998 as Collegio d'Eccellenza. Together with the Institute for Advanced Study it is part of the Institute for Higher Study.
The Collegio Superiore offers an additional educational path to students enrolled in a degree programme at the University of Bologna, providing specialized courses as part of an interdisciplinary framework.
All students of the Collegio Superiore are granted a full-ride scholarship and additional benefits such as the assistance of a personal tutor and free accommodation at the Residence for Higher Study. In order to remain members of the Collegio Superiore students are required to maintain high marks in both their degree programme and the additional courses.
Beatrice Fraboni, professor of Physics of Matter, has been head of Collegio Superiore since 2019.

Notable people

Alumni

Faculty and staff

Notable former faculty include:

Rankings and reputation

The 2024 QS World University Rankings ranked the University of Bologna 154th in the world as well as 73rd with specific reference to academic reputation. In another measurement by the same organization, it was positioned among the world's top 100 universities for graduate employability.
In the 2024 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, it claimed the 155th place globally. In the 2023 THE Impact Rankings, which measure the universities' commitment to sustainable development in compliance with the UN 2030 Agenda, Bologna took 5th place in Europe and 23rd in the world.
Furthermore, Bologna topped Italy's 2023 list of large public universities, produced by the Italian Center for Social Investment Studies, for the 14th year in a row.

Points of interest

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