German Universities (II)

It is well know that German universities are some of the oldest and most well respected in Europe. The German university model has been applied at research universities throughout the West, and with enormous success. Some of the finest minds in Germany’s long and varied history have had their ideas and careers shaped by their experiences at German universities. Although many of the oldest schools in the nation were thrown into turmoil during the arduous twentieth century, which devastated and reshaped many of Germany’s institutions of higher learning, these schools still have a worldwide reputation for excellence, and continue to educate Germany’s best and brightest today.

Founded in 1386 in Heidelberg, in the state that is currently Baden-Württemberg, the University of Heidelberg is the oldest of the German universities, as well as the third university established within the Holy Roman Empire. During the Great Schism in 1378—a divisive event that split the allegiances of Europe’s Catholics between two popes, one Italian and one French—many Germans came to back the Italian pope, a fact that got many German students expelled from universities in France. As a result, Rupert I, an Elector Palatine, founded the University of Heidelberg so that German students would have a place to study. The University’s motto, simper apertus, which translates to “always open,” refers to the scholarly stance on the book of learning. In recent decades, Heidelberg has become one of the prominent centers of the German student left, with student protests taking place frequently. Today, the university educates over 26,000 students, and has nearly 3,000 faculty members on staff. The university has several campuses around the city.

 Frankfurt University, also known as Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main) is another of the prominent German universities. Founded in 1914, Frankfurt University was renamed after the most famous citizen of Frankfurt in Germany’s history, the poet and polymath Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. It has a reputation for leaning to the left in matters of politics, with many Marxist scholars among the faculty. During the reign of the Third Reich, more students were expelled because of their ethnicity and politics than were expelled from any other university in Germany. Many famous scholars of the twentieth century have emerged from Frankfurt University’s Institute for Social Research, including Jürgen Habermas, Erich Fromm, and Walter Benjamin. Recently, the university has established the Institute for Law and Finance, as well as the Goethe Business School, which grants MBA degrees to students in conjunction with Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.

These, as well as other German universities, are among some of the finest in Europe, and the world.