West University of Timișoara

Sever Bocu, first head of the Ephoria (board) of the West University

The establishment of the West University of Timișoara was a complex and long process. It was done in stages, in an internal and international political, social and economic context marked by World War II and the territorial resettlements caused by the loss of Bessarabia, Northern Bukovina and Hertsa region (in the north), as well as Southern Dobruja (in the south). 1940 brings major changes in the academic life of Timișoara. After the Second Vienna Award, which saw Northern Transylvania ceded to Hungary, the faculties of Agronomy, Theology and Sciences from Cluj relocated to Timișoara.[7] Notable for the establishment of the future West University are the insistent and mobilizing approaches of the politician and culture man Sever Bocu who, through his humanistic and cultural policy ideas, exerted a strong influence in the Romanian society in Banat, between 1920 and 1945.[8] Although the Faculty of Sciences returned after 1945 in Cluj, a good part of the academics from Cluj remained in Timișoara, such as Coriolan Drăgulescu, Mihail Ghermănescu, Gheorghe Th. Gheorghiu, Emilian Arghiriade, Ioan Curea, Gheorghe Silaș, Maria Neumann, Gheorghe Ostrogovich, Alexandru Cișmaș, Constantin Sălceanu and others, who were at the forefront of those who campaigned for the establishment of the West University, as the fourth university of the country.[8]

The West University was formally established by Decree-Law no. 660 of 30 December 1944, promulgated by King Michael I. This act provided for the newly established institute to operate starting with the academic year 1944/1945 with the following specializations: Law, Letters and Philosophy, Sciences, Human Medicine, Veterinary Medicine, Pharmacy and Theology.[9] The transposition of the Decree into reality has provoked contradictory discussions and tensions caused by vainglory and rivalry both locally and regionally; six of the seven faculties of the future West University were claimed by other cities (Arad, Lugoj, Caransebeș), there was the intention of some local ethnic groups to impose a bilingual organization of university education, which endangered the creation and operation of a university with a unitary organizational structure in Timișoara.[8]

The dissensions within the Ephoria of the West University, the increasingly hostile actions of the communist authorities, imposed by the Soviet occupiers, led to the annulment, in essence, of the provisions of the Royal Decree for the establishment of the country's fourth university.[8] In 1945, the government of Petru Groza decreed that the West University would first be a Faculty of Medicine. Obstacles have multiplied. Local and government funding sources were insufficient and, in addition, their management was blamed. Sever Bocu is fired from Ephoria's leadership, which will eventually be dissolved.[8]

In the following years, under the pressure of the process of Sovietization of Romania, through the forced transposition of the Soviet economic and cultural models in the USSR, the reorganization of higher education took place. Based on the Decree no. 175 of 3 August 1948 and the Decision no. 263327 of 25 October 1948 regarding the organization of the Romanian higher education, in Timișoara the three-year Pedagogical Institute with the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics was established, having the mission to prepare teachers for grades VIII–XI.[8] The courses of the Pedagogical Institute began on 19 January 1949, in a modest space, with 82 students.[7]

In the academic year 1952/1953, the duration of studies at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics was set at four years. An evening section also starts operating within the Pedagogical Institute.[8] The academic year 1956/1957 marks a new and important stage in the development of the Institute. The Faculty of Philology was inaugurated, with a duration of studies of five years, distance learning was introduced at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, and from the following year, the duration of studies at this faculty becomes five years.[8] A new group of young teachers with great potential arrives in Timisoara, submitting a memorandum to the ministry, requesting its transformation into a university, the separation of departments into distinct faculties and the elaboration by graduates of a diploma thesis.[7] In 1957, the director of the Institute became rector, and the new institution was configured as an educational and cultural center worthy of consideration.[7]

The main building on Vasile Pârvan Boulevard was completed in 1964 after a project by architect Hans Fackelmann. The mosaic on its facade, which depicts Mihai Eminescu and Nicolae Bălcescu, was made by portraitist and muralist Ștefan Szönyi.[10]

By the Decision of the Council of Ministers no. 999 of 27 September 1962, the memorandum submitted in 1956, which establishes the new organization status and the name of the University of Timișoara, is accepted. In the same year, the works start at the new university building, on Vasile Pârvan Boulevard, under the coordination of the architect Hans Fackelmann.[7] His project was awarded by the State Committee for Construction, Architecture and Systematization (CSCAS) in 1964 and by the Union of Architects in Romania (UAR) in 1967.[11]

In 1967/1968, the newly established Faculty of Economics was added,[7] then the faculties of the three-year Pedagogical Institute. After a period of hybrid operation with specializations with study cycles of three, four and five years (1962–1967), the integration into a unitary university structure is completed.[8] In 1970 there were 12 faculties, with 20 specializations. During the years 1962–1989, the evolution of the university was conditioned, under the strict control of the activities in the Romanian education, of the educational act and of professional training, by ministerial orders and decisions marked ideologically. The inconsistency of the program, with its alleged orientation towards modernization, has led to uncertainty and instability in university structures and activities. Faculties, sections, specializations, departments, disciplines were established and abolished, most often without any good motivation.[8] By 1989, in the University of Timișoara there were only three profiles. The humanist profile, inextricably linked to the concept imagined by the interwar intellectuals, as fundamental to the West University, had become almost non-existent.[12]

After the 1989 Revolution, the reorganization of the university and the democratization of education have raised issues of great importance to the new leadership of the faculties and the university. Tensions, turmoil and efforts to change also took place at the University of Timișoara. From the first days following the abolition of the totalitarian regime, the teachers dismissed the last leadership established by the Communist Party and replaced the rector appointed in October 1989. The philologist Eugen Todoran thus became the first rector of the university in the post-communist period.[7] The academic year 1990/1991 opens in a modified framework, with new specializations and faculties: Fine Arts and Design, Physical Education and Sports, Chemistry, Geography, Biology, Psychology and Sociology, Law, Music and Theater Arts, the duration of schooling being established at five years.[7]

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the West University by Decree-Law no. 600/1944, the Ministry of Education, at the request of the teachers, decides that the name of the institution should be the West University of Timișoara. At the end of the 1995/1996 academic year, the West University of Timișoara had eight faculties, a Department for Teaching Staff Development, 40 long-term specializations, a short-term specialization (three years, Information Technology), 12 master's and in-depth studies specializations, a program of European Higher Education.[7]

The 2000s were one of the most dynamic periods in the history of the university, characterized by a very large number of students, constant concerns for improving infrastructure, by building new buildings. The youngest of the university's faculties, the Faculty of Political Sciences, Philosophy and Communication Sciences, was founded in 2004.[7] Since 2012 UVT is a member of the strongest university consortium in Romania, the Universitaria Consortium, a joint project of five of the most prestigious universities in the country (University of Bucharest, Babeș-Bolyai University of Cluj-Napoca, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iași and the Academy of Economic Studies of Bucharest).[7]

The Organization of Students of the West University of Timișoara (OSUT) is the only union-student organization established at the level of the West University of Timișoara, founded on 27 March 1990,[18] which makes it the most representative organization of the university. It deals with student representation, providing basic services for them and organizing projects.[19] OSUT is a full member of the National Alliance of Student Organizations in Romania (ANOSR) and often active in the European Students' Union (ESU).[18]

Other organizations that operate within the university are:[20]

• Association internationale des étudiants en sciences économiques et commerciales (AIESEC)
• Association for Romanians Abroad Inițiativa
• Exact Science Students' Association from the University of Timișoara (ASSEUT)
• Timișoara Psychology and Sociology Students Association (ASPST)
• European Law Students' Association (ELSA)
• Erasmus Student Network (ESN)
• Timișoara Geography Students Association (GEOTIM)
• Bessarabian Students' Organization from Timișoara (OSB)
• Young Accountants Association (YAA)

UVT students are accommodated in the C3, C12, C13, C15, C16, C17 and G4 dormitories in Complexul Studențesc and in the Camelia, Drept and Renașterii dormitories spread in different locations in the city.[25] As of 2018, UVT has a capacity of 3,005 accommodation places[26] (out of the 13,000 in the whole complex).[27] However, UVT can only cover 60% of applications.[26]

The West University has two sports halls: one on Vasile Pârvan Boulevard and another on Oituz Street. The first consists of a gym of 151.19 m² and a sports hall of 538.56 m².[28] The second was inaugurated in 2015 and covers 1,700 m².[29] It has locker rooms for athletes and referees, fitness equipment, a doctor's office and 150 seats in the stands. In the Oituz area, UVT representatives intend to arrange several outdoor sports fields, as well as a swimming pool.[29]

Also, in Vasile Pârvan Boulevard there is a handball field, with an area of 600 m², also used for minifootball and a basketball court with bitumen surface.[30]

Eugen Todoran Central University Library

The library was established by Decree-Law no. 660 of 30 December 1944, issued by King Michael I[31] and named after the Romanian philologist Eugen Todoran, who, as rector of the university, supported its transformation into an academic library. At first, the library's bookstock consisted mainly of mathematics and physics books and magazines. After the Faculty of Philology was founded in 1956, the library of the Pedagogical Institute acquired an encyclopedic profile and was continuously enriched. Since 1962, with the transformation of the Pedagogical Institute into a university, the Central Library of the University of Timișoara has developed rapidly. Since 1975, it has been entitled to a legal deposit.[31] Since 1992, by Order of the Minister of Education no. 6237 of 14 September, the Library of the University of Timișoara became the Central University Library, an institution of national interest, with legal personality, similar to those in Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and Iași.[31]

The library operates in a central headquarters, at 4A Vasile Pârvan Boulevard, which consists of two buildings: A – the old building and B – the new building.[32] Branch libraries are organized in the headquarters of some faculties of the West University. As of 2019, the library's bookstock consists of over 1.1 million volumes,[33] and access to them is based on a reader's card issued by the library.

In addition, UVT has its own publishing house and printing house. Founded in 2001,[34] the publishing house covers many fields of study and research: anthropology, ethnology, philology, philosophy, physics, mathematics, psychology, sociology, cultural studies, communication sciences, education sciences, economics, politics, theology, translation studies, etc.[35] It is recognized by the National Council for Scientific Research in Higher Education (CNCSIS).[36]

The planetarium was inaugurated on 1 January 1964, a first in Romania at that time.[37] The construction of this planetarium, as well as the construction of the astronomical observatory (now property of the Romanian Academy), were possible due to the efforts of astronomer and seismologist Ioan Curea, the first rector of the University of Timișoara.[38] Open to public since November 2022,[39] it is also used by university students, especially those taking astronomy and astrophysics courses at the Faculty of Physics. The original planetarium projector is a Zeiss ZKP-1.[39]

The Mansarda Gallery is located in the attic of the Faculty of Arts and Design. The gallery is spacious and adapted for exhibition activities, conferences, round tables, etc.[40]