Prof. Aleksa Bjeliš as President of the University of Zagreb Visited NCKU

TAINAN, Taiwan-(Business Wire)-September 29, 2009 - Professor Aleksa Bjeliš as President of the University of Zagreb, Croatia, had a one-day visit at the National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) on September 28 to meet the NCKU President, Academician Michael Ming-Chiao Lai for the first time. This is also the first time for President Aleksa Bjeliš coming over Tainan. President Bjeliš and President Lai had quite constructive discussion in the fields of international students and globalization. They are looking forward to cooperating and signing the agreement around some interest areas in the future.

Before meeting with President Lai, President Bjeliš was introduced by Prof. Chio-Zong Cheng as the Director of NCKU Plasma and Space Science Center to visit related plasma and space science equipments in NCKU. He was very much interested about that due to his research interests. President Bjeliš hoped to build up closer collaboration between both universities in the near future.

President Lai highly cordially received President Bjeliš from the University of Zagreb, Croatia. President Lai also mentioned that his daughter just visited Croatia last year, and left with very beautiful memory about Croatia with beautiful and glorious nature and history. President Bjeliš also replied that there are more and more visitors coming to Croatia. Right now, three languages are used in lecturing in University of Zagreb as Croatian, French and English. More and more of their students started to pick up Chinese with more popularity of Chinese language in the world. Certainly, there will be more Chinese courses in the future.

Currently, there are around 200 to 300 international students studying in the University of Zagreb, Croatia. “I hope that we will have the chance to exchange our students with National Cheng Kung University, and create more opportunities to collaborate with each other,” said President Bjeliš. President Lai also mentioned that exchange students within both universities will be the beginning of the collaboration.

“We do not have any collaboration up to now. I will ask my colleagues to concentrate and invest more on research look forward to collaboration with each other when I go back to the University of Zagreb,” said President Bjeliš. President Lai also commented that we should search some mutually interested areas especially in technology to sign the agreement with collaboration in the future.

About the University of Zagreb, Croatia

The University of Zagreb is the oldest Croatian university and also the oldest university in South East Europe. The university was officially founded 23 September 1669 by Emperor and King Leopold I Habsburg who issued a decree granting the status and privileges of a university to the Jesuit Academy of the Royal Free City of Zagreb. According to that document the study of philosophy in Zagreb acquired a formal and legal status as Neoacademia Zagrabiensis and officially became a public institution of higher education.

The Academy was run by the Jesuits for more than a century when the Jesuit order was dissolved by Pope Clement XIV in 1773. Under a new leadership in 1772 the Academy enrolled a total of 200 students.

In 1776 Empress and Queen Maria Theresa issued a decree founding the Royal Academy of Science (Regia Scientiarum Academia) consisting of three studies or faculties - Philosophy, Theology and Law. The former political-cameral studies became part of the newly established Faculty of Law, and thus were integrated into the Academy. Each of the faculties of the Royal Academy of Sciences had several chairs teaching one or several courses.

The Academy in Zagreb remained until 1874, despite numerous organizational changes, the focal institution of higher education in Croatia, educating most of the members of the Croatian intelligentsia.

Bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer in 1861 proposed to the Croatian Parliament that a legal basis be established for the founding of the University of Zagreb. During his visit to Zagreb in 1869 the Emperor Franz Joseph signed the Decree on the Establishment of the University of Zagreb. Five years later the Parliament passed the Act of Founding, which was ratified by the Emperor on 5 January 1874. On 19 October 1874 a ceremony was held in the name of the founding of the modern University of Zagreb.

Ever since its foundation, the University has been continually growing and developing and now consist of 29 faculties, three art academies and the Centre for Croatian Studies. With its comprehensive programmers and over 50,000 full-time undergraduate and postgraduate students the University is the strongest teaching institution in Croatia. It offers a wide range of academic degree courses leading to Bachelor's, Master's and Doctoral degrees in the following fields: Arts, Biomedicine, Biotechnology, Engineering, Humanities, Natural and Social Sciences. It is also a strongly research-oriented institution, contributing with over 50 percent to the total research output of the country.

About Prof. Aleksa Bjeliš as President of the University of Zagreb

President Aleksa Bjeliš was born at 2nd February 1947 in Rijeka, Croatia, and was conferred with the Bachelor Degree, Master Degree and Doctor Degree in University of Zagreb. Prof. Bjeliš devoted his life in University of Zagreb for a long time from 1971 up to now. He worked as a researcher at the Institute of Physics of the University, Zagreb from 1971 to 1986. After that, he assumed duties as a professor in the Dept. of Physics, Faculty of Science, the University of Zagreb in 1997. Subsequently, he was Dean of the Faculty of Science from 2000 to 2002, and Vice-President for science and development of the University of Zagreb from 2002 to 2006. In 2006, Prof. Bjeliš assumed his duty as the President of the University of Zagreb, Croatia.

President Bjeliš has about 70 scientific publications, mostly in international open journals, invited talks at about fifteen international conferences, schools, etc. He also participated at about twenty five international conferences, visiting professor or scientist at about twenty universities and scientific institutes in France, U.S.A., Canada, Italy, Switzerland, Slovenia and Hungary.

About National Cheng Kung University (NCKU):

NCKU is located in the ancient city of Tainan, the historical and ancient cultural capital city of Taiwan, which boasts more than 50 national relics sanctioned by the government and is approximately 250 kilometers south of Taipei. It is connected to all major cities in Taiwan by the recently initiated state-of-the-art Taiwan High Speed Rail. Further, this historical heritage is the pride of Tainan City and represents a rich cultural resource to NCKU. The technological sectors in the Southern Taiwan Science Park offer students at NCKU with a stage to apply what they have learned into practice.

With three quarters of a century of distinguished history, with well over 130,000 powerful alumni now dotting the globe, many have achieved supreme successes in arts, business, education, science, technology and healthcare and are ready and willing to assist, with 22,000 academic selective students and 1200 academically significant faculty members currently, both have healthy dosage of international flavor, with enormous regional support, and with a permeating culture of proactive intellectual growth on the world’s stage, NCKU in Tainan, Taiwan, has evolved from its engineering genesis to become a powerful comprehensive, research and international university in Asia Pacific.

Since NCKU’s establishment in 1931, it has developed into a research intensive and comprehensive university with integrated academic fields in nine colleges: Liberal Arts, Sciences, Engineering, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science, Planning & Design, Management, Social Sciences, Medicine, and Bioscience & Biotechnology. NCKU currently offers 40 undergraduate programs (excluding Program of Bachelor’s Degree), 78 master’s degree programs, 54 doctoral programs and 20 master’s degree programs for working professionals.

Photos:

http://www.cna.com.tw/postwrite/cvpread.aspx?ID=38799

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