University of Nice Sophia Antipolis

University of Nice Sophia Antipolis (often abbreviated to UNSA) was founded on October the 23rd 1965. As its predecessor the Collegium Jurisconsultorum Niciensium can be taken. It was founded in 17th century by the prince of Savoie as an important school of law, jurisdiction and consultancy. The name Sophia Antipolis was added in 1989 and by this the University showed its relation with the Sophia Antipolis technology park (the centre for high tech business activity in Europe, located on the north west of Nice, 22 km far away).

There are 27 000 students studying at the University. It covers all the disciplines and all the levels of diplomas and no other higher education institution in a range of 150 km. Pluridisciplinarity and geographical position warrant that two thirds of the students find a job on the local labour market.

The University consists of eight faculties, two autonomous institutes and an engineer’s school. Faculties’ names are: Droit, Sciences Politiques, Economiques et de Gestion; Institut du Droit, de la Paix et du Développement; Espaces et Cultures; Lettres, Arts et Sciences Humaines; Médecine; Odontologie; Sciences and Sciences et Techniques des Activités Physiques et Sportives. The two institutions are Institut d'Administration des Entreprises and Institut Universitaire de Technologie and the engineer’s school Ecole Polytechnique Universitaire - Polytech Nice-Sophia. The university's Institute of Languages gives summer courses in French to foreign students.

There are three main historic campuses of UNSA. The Valrose campus (housing Sciences), the Trotabas campus (housing Law, Economics and Management) and the Carlone campus (housing Letters, Arts and Humanities). Besides these three main campuses there are some other locations like the new Saint-Jean d'Angely campus in Nice and Sophia Antipolis or Villefranche sur Mer outside Nice.