The University of NamurorUniversité de Namur (UNamur) is a Jesuit universityinNamur, in the French Community of Belgium. Both teaching and research in the university are carried out by six faculties.[2]
Université de Namur
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Former seal of the University of Namur
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| Type | Catholic |
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| Established | 1831; 193 years ago (1831) |
| Rector | Annick Castiaux |
| Students | 7,236 (2023-24)[1] |
| Location | , |
| Website | www |
| Data as of 2024[update] | |
The University of Namur is located in Namur, Belgium. The main campus is located at the heart of the city of Namur, capital of Wallonia. The main university campus includes the university building, the six main faculties and the university libraries.
In the spring of 1831, the Society of Jesus reopened a high school in what was earlier the Our-Lady of Peace Benedictine abbey, in Namur. The school immediately developed into a college with the support of prominent Namurian families. They put some conditions in order to finance the new project, the most important is teaching other sciences such as philosophy with the liberty of education as proclaimed by the new Belgian Constitution.
Many expansions took place in this period, the number of students increased gradually, new sciences and study programmes were introduced.
A New Belgian law excluded the institution from getting financial support from the government. This pushed the ambitious university to rely on its own sources and funds. Despite this, in 1934, many projects were launched: new building specific to physical and chemical studies, the expansion of Belles-Lettres library, modernization of some laboratories, many new titles were added to the seminars library.
On 18 February 1948 the institution, formerly a college, changed its status to that of a university. This new status resulted in having some (limited and irregular) financial aid from the government.
Starting in 1960, after the introduction of new national financing laws, government aid increased and became regular. Many new projects and programmes came into being, improving the university's national and European visibility.
The university launched many important projects:
On 29 June 2003 the University of Namur joined with three other French-speaking Catholic universities to form the Académie Louvain. These are the University of Louvain (UCLouvain), located in Louvain-La-Neuve; Saint-Louis University, Brussels (now UCLouvain Saint-Louis - Bruxelles), located in Brussels and Ixelles; and the Facultés universitaires catholiques de Mons, (FUCaM, now UCLouvain FUCaM Mons) located in Mons and Charleroi (now UCLouvain Charleroi).
Explorations developed in 2007 for combining all four institutions into a single university, and an agreement was reached to create a new university to be called Université catholique de Louvain (Académie Louvain Project).[3] Campuses might be identified as UCL/Brussels (today UCLouvain Bruxelles), UCL/Namur (today UCLouvain Namur), UCL/Louvain-la-Neuve, UCL/Mons (today UCLouvain FUCaM Mons) and UCL/Charleroi (today UCLouvain Charleroi). However, in December 2010 negotiations for a full merger were aborted by an insufficient vote by the general assembly of Facultés Universitaires Notre-Dame de la Paix (FUNDP).[4]
The "Academie Louvain" ceased to exist in 2014 due to the entry in force of the new law organising the universities.
| University rankings | |
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| Global – Overall | |
| CWUR World[5] | 1367 (2022–23) |
| THE World[6] | 801–1000 (2023) |
| USNWR Global[7] | =1494 (2022) |
The university is included in some major world university rankings: the U.S. News & World Report Best Global University Ranking of 2021 lists University of Namur as 1436th in the world,[8] and the Center for World University Rankings of 2020-2021 lists the university as 1201st in the world.[9]
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50°27′58.80″N 4°51′37.36″E / 50.4663333°N 4.8603778°E / 50.4663333; 4.8603778