Addis Ababa University (AAU) ( am, አዲስ አበባ ዩኒቨርሲቲ) is a
national university
A national university is mainly a university created or managed by a government, but which may also at the same time operate autonomously without direct control by the state.
Some national universities are associated with national cultural or po ...
located in
Addis Ababa
Addis Ababa (; am, አዲስ አበባ, , new flower ; also known as , lit. "natural spring" in Oromo), is the capital and largest city of Ethiopia. It is also served as major administrative center of the Oromia Region. In the 2007 census, t ...
, Ethiopia. It is the oldest university in Ethiopia. AAU has thirteen campuses. Twelve of these are situated in Addis Ababa, and one is located in
Bishoftu
Bishoftu (; ) is a town in central Ethiopia. Located in the East Shewa Zone of the Oromia Region, it sits at an elevation of 1,920 metres (6,300 ft). It was formerly known as Debre Zeyit () however since the late 1990s it has been officially kn ...
, about away. AAU has several associated research institutions including the Institute of
Ethiopian Studies. The
Ministry of Education
An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...
admits qualified students to AAU based on their score on the Ethiopian University Entrance Examination (EUEE).
History
![ET Addis asv2018-01 img13 University gate](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/ET_Addis_asv2018-01_img13_University_gate.jpg)
The origins of AAU was a two-year college in 1950 by the Jesuit
Lucien Matte
Lucien Matte SJ (1907–1973) was a Canadian Jesuit priest and educator. He was President of the University of Sudbury and founder and president of the Addis Ababa University.
In 1946, Emperor Haile Selassie, who favoured the Jesuit educational p ...
, at the appeal of ''His Majesty Emperor''
Haile Selassie I
Haile Selassie I ( gez, ቀዳማዊ ኀይለ ሥላሴ, Qädamawi Häylä Səllasé, ; born Tafari Makonnen; 23 July 189227 August 1975) was Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974. He rose to power as Regent Plenipotentiary of Ethiopia ('' ...
. It began operations the following year. Over the following two years an affiliation with the
University of London
The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...
, and
University of Oxford
, mottoeng = The Lord is my light
, established =
, endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019)
, budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20)
, chancellor ...
was developed. Africans from various parts of the continent would receive free scholarships through programs subsidized by the
Organisation of African Unity
The Organisation of African Unity (OAU; french: Organisation de l'unité africaine, OUA) was an intergovernmental organization established on 25 May 1963 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, with 32 signatory governments. One of the main heads for OAU's ...
for higher learning. AAU was also known for sending its students abroad for an extended interpersonal educational experience, and having those students return with the exemplary standards of the international community.
The nucleus of AAU was formed with the establishment of the University College of Addis Ababa (UCAA) in 1950. UCAA, which initially consisted of the Faculties of Arts and Science, became a fully fledged college when it was chartered in 1954. In 1955, the Building College was opened. In February 1961, these various colleges and the Theological College were brought together to form the Haile Selassie University. ''Emperor'' Haile Selassie I gave his
Guenete Leul Palace
The Guenete Leul Palace ("Paradise of Princes") is a palace in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. It was built by Emperor Haile Selassie in 1930. The Emperor and his family made the palace their main residence, but the seat of government remained at the Imp ...
to serve as the administration building and main campus. He had abandoned the palace, where a number of his ministers and favorites were killed in the wake of the abortive Coup d'état in 1960, in favor of the new Jubilee Palace.
Following the 1974 revolution, the university was briefly renamed University of Ethiopia (National University) before it came to assume its present designation, AAU, in 1975. In the wake of the revolution, AAU was closed for two years and students and staff were drafted into what was known as the Development through Cooperation Campaign (''zemecha''), designed to arise the awareness of the rural population in the spirit of the revolution.
The university offered its first Master's programs in 1979 and its first PhD programs in 1987.
Administration
Until 1974 the charter provided for a governance structure in the following descending order or authority: Chancellor (the Emperor himself); the Board of Governors, composed of ministers and members of the royal family; and the Faculty Council, made up of the university officers, deans, directors and elected members. The Faculty later became the Senate. In 1977, the AAU lost its relative autonomy when it was brought under the Commission for Higher Education, which came to exercise administrative jurisdiction over all institutions of higher learning.
In 1993, AAU was placed under the Ministry of Education by a government proclamation.
Influence
Over and above their academic pursuits, AAU students have been actively engaged in community service (such as conducting literacy programs) and political struggle, particularly in the years before the 1974 revolution. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, students were required to do a year of national service under the Ethiopia University Service program. University teachers and students were instrumental in exposing the hidden 1973 famine and launching the first famine relief program.
The Ethiopian Student Movement, of which the university was the birthplace and main venue, played a pivotal role in bringing about the revolution.
Almost all leaders of the political organizations that were active in the revolutionary years or are in power now had their political formation inside the university.
In 2013/2014, there were 33,940 undergraduate students, 13,000 graduate students, and 1,733 PhD students, making a total student body of 48,673.
Campuses and colleges
Colleges
* College of Biological Engineering
* College of Social Sciences
* College of Humanities, Language Studies, Journalism and communication
* College of Development Studies
* College of Business and Economics
* College of Law and Governance Studies
* College of Education and Behavioral Studies
* College of Natural and Computational Sciences
*
Skunder Boghossian
Alexander "Skunder" Boghossian (July 22, 1937 – May 4, 2003) was an Ethiopian-Armenian painter and art teacher. He spent much of his life living and working in the United States. He was one of the first, and by far the most acclaimed, contem ...
College of Performing and Visual Arts
* College of Veterinary Medicine and Agriculture
* College of Health Science
Research and teaching institutes
* Academy of Ethiopian Languages and Cultures
* Addis Ababa Institute of Technology
*
Aklilu Lemma
Aklilu Lemma (; 18 September 1935 – 5 April 1997) was an Ethiopian pathobiologist. In 1989, he was awarded the Right Livelihood Award "for discovering and campaigning relentlessly for an affordable preventative against bilharzia."
Education
...
Institute of Pathobiology
* Ethiopian Institute of Architecture, Building Construction and City Development
* Ethiopian Institute of Water Resources
* Institute of Biotechnology
* Institute of Educational Research
*
Institute of Ethiopian Studies
The Institute of Ethiopian Studies (IES) was officially established in 1963 to collect information on Ethiopian civilization, its history, cultures, and languages.Pankhurst, Richard. "Institute of Ethiopian Studies." In Encyclopaedia Aethiopica: He ...
* Institute of Geophysics, Space Science and Astronomy
* Institute of Peace and Security Studies
* Horn of Africa Regional Center and Environment Network
* Institute of Development and Policy Research/IDPR/
Schools
* Alle School of Fine Arts and Design
* School of Allied Health Sciences
* School of Commerce
* School of Earth Sciences
* School of Information Science
* School of Journalism and Communications
* School of Medicine
* School of Pharmacy
* School of Public Health
* School of Social Work
*
Yared
Saint Yared ( Ge'ez: ቅዱስ ያሬድ; 25 April 505 – 20 May 571) was an Aksumite composer in the 6th century. Often credited with the forerunner of traditional music of Ethiopia and Eritrea, he developed the music of the Ethiopian Orth ...
School of Music
* Yoftahe Nigussie School of Theatrical Arts
Notable dropouts
*
Isaias Afwerki
Isaias Afwerki ( ti, ኢሳይያስ ኣፍወርቂ, ; born 2 February 1946) is an Eritrean politician and partisan who has been the president of Eritrea since shortly after he led the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) to victory in ...
abandoned his studies in 1966 and traveled to Kassala, Sudan to join the
Eritrean Liberation Front
ar, جبهة التحرير الإريترية it, Fronte di Liberazione Eritreo
, war = the Ethiopian Civil War, Eritrean War of Independence and the Eritrean Civil Wars
, image =
, caption = Flag of the ELF ...
.
*
Meles Zenawi
Meles Zenawi Asres (Tigrinya and ; , born Legesse Zenawi Asres; 9 May 1955 – 20 August 2012) was an Ethiopian soldier and politician who served as President of Ethiopia from 1991 to 1995 and then Prime Minister of Ethiopia from 1995 until his ...
in 1975 left the university to join the
Tigray People's Liberation Front
The Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF; ti, ህዝባዊ ወያነ ሓርነት ትግራይ, lit=Popular Struggle for the Freedom of Tigray), also called the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front, is a left-wing ethnic nationalist paramilitar ...
and fight against the Derg (the
Mengistu Haile Mariam
Mengistu Haile Mariam ( am, መንግሥቱ ኀይለ ማሪያም, pronunciation: ; born 21 May 1937) is an Ethiopian politician and former army officer who was the head of state of Ethiopia from 1977 to 1991 and General Secretary of the Work ...
-led
military government
A military government is generally any form of government that is administered by military forces, whether or not this government is legal under the laws of the jurisdiction at issue, and whether this government is formed by natives or by an occup ...
in Ethiopia).
Notable alumni
Prime Ministers
*
Hailemariam Desalegn
Hailemariam Desalegn Boshe ( amh, ኃይለማሪያም ደሳለኝ ቦሼ; born 19 July 1965) is an Ethiopian politician who served as prime minister of Ethiopia from 2012 to 2018. He also previously served as deputy prime minister and Minister ...
(2012-2018)
*
Abiy Ahmed Ali
Abiy Ahmed Ali ( om, Abiyi Ahmed Alii; am, አብይ አሕመድ ዐሊ; born 15 August 1976) is an Ethiopian politician who has been the 4th prime minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia since 2 April 2018. He won the 2019 ...
(2018-)
Presidents
*
Rupiah Banda
Rupiah Bwezani Banda (19 February 1937 – 11 March 2022) was a Zambian politician who served as the fourth president of Zambia from 2008 to 2011, taking over from Levy Mwanawasa, who died as the sitting president. Banda was an active participant ...
(Zambia) (1959-1960)
*
Mustafa Mohoumed Omer (
Somali Region
The Somali Region ( so, Deegaanka Soomaalida, am, ሱማሌ ክልል, Sumalē Kilil, ar, المنطقة الصومالية), also known as Soomaali Galbeed (''Western Somalia'') and officially the Somali Regional State, is a regional state ...
)
Vice presidents
*
Hirut Woldemariam
Hirut Woldemariam (; born 24 October 1975) is an Ethiopian writer, teacher, politician and former minister of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education (Ethiopia), Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. She ...
Physicists
*
Mulugeta Bekele
Mulugeta Bekele (born 2 January 1947) is an Ethiopian scientist and academic. He is an associate Professor of Physics at Addis Ababa University (AAU), Ethiopia. He completed his PhD in Physics at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, Indi ...
Historians
*
Taddesse Tamrat
Taddesse Tamrat ( am, ታደሰ ታምራት; 4 August 1935 – 23 May 2013) was an Ethiopian historian and scholar of Ethiopian studies. He is best known as the author of ''Church and State in Ethiopia 1270–1520'' (1972, Oxford University Pre ...
*
Kinfe Abraham
Kinfe Abraham (, ''kinəfä abərəhamə''; 20 October 1950 – 8 November 2007) was an Ethiopian academic and politician nicknamed 'Mr Quagmire'. He was president of the Ethiopian International Institute for Peace and Development, as well as pres ...
*
Merid Wolde Aregay
Merid Wolde Aregay (1934 or 1935 – 2008) was an Ethiopian historian and a scholar of Ethiopian studies.
Merid Wolde Aregay was born in Adwa in 1927 according to the Ethiopian calendar. He earned his BA in 1956 from what was called Univers ...
Biologists
*
Tewolde Berhan Gebre Egziabher
Tewolde Berhan Gebre Egziabher (; born 19 February 1940) is an Ethiopian scientist who won the Right Livelihood Award in 2000 "for his exemplary work to safeguard biodiversity and the traditional rights of farmers and communities to their geneti ...
*
Legesse Wolde-Yohannes
Legesse Wolde-Yohannes is an Ethiopian horticultural scientist. He cooperated with Aklilu Lemma on the discovery and research on how to use the plant endod as a means of preventing the parasitic disease bilharzia
Schistosomiasis, also known a ...
*
Sebsebe Demissew
Sebsebe Demissew (born June 14, 1953) is a Professor of Systematics, Plant Systematics and Biodiversity at Addis Ababa University and Executive Director of the Gullele Botanic Garden in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Education
Demissew was educated at A ...
*
Segenet Kelemu
Segenet Kelemu () is an Ethiopian scientist, noted for her research as a molecular plant pathologist, and outstanding scientific leadership. For close to three decades, Kelemu and her team's research has contributed to addressing agricultural c ...
*
Masresha Fetene
Engineers
*
Simegnew Bekele
Chemists
*
Sinknesh Ejigu
Sinknesh Ejigu Wolde-Mariam (born 1956) is an Ethiopian politician, chemist and businesswoman. She is currently Ethiopian Ambassador to Brazil, Argentina and Chile.
Biography
She was born in Ambo west of Addis Ababa to a family of eight in 1956. ...
Linguists
*
Azeb Amha
Azeb Amha (1967) is a linguist working on the morphology and syntax of Afroasiatic languages, with a special focus on Omotic languages. A senior researcher at the African Studies Center Leiden, Azeb is co-editor of the international ''Journal of ...
Pharmacologists
*
Eleni Aklillu
Anthropologists
*
Berhane Asfaw
Berhane Asfaw (Amharic: በርሃነ አስፋው) (born August 22, 1954 in Gondar, Ethiopia) is an Ethiopian paleontologist of Rift Valley Research Service, who co-discovered human skeletal remains at Herto Bouri, Ethiopia later classified as ...
*
Yohannes Haile-Selassie
Yohannes Haile-Selassie Ambaye (born 23 February 1961) is an Ethiopian paleoanthropologist. An authority on pre-''Homo sapiens'' hominids, he particularly focuses his attention on the East African Rift and Middle Awash valleys.Mangels, John (20 ...
*
Zeresenay Alemseged
Zeresenay "Zeray" Alemseged (born 4 June 1969) is an Ethiopian paleoanthropologist who was the Chair of the Anthropology Department at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, United States. He recently joined the faculty of the Un ...
*
Alula Pankhurst
Alula Pankhurst (born 1962) is an Ethiopian scholar and social development consultant whose main focus is Ethiopia and Ethiopian studies. He has worked in Ethiopia for many years in a variety of positions including as an associate professor of a ...
Authors
*
Hama Tuma
Hama Tuma (born May 25, 1949) is an Ethiopian poet and writer in the Amharic and English languages.
Biography
Born in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Tuma studied Law in Addis Ababa University. He became an advocate for democracy and justice. This has ca ...
*
Sebhat Gebre-Egziabher
Sebhat-Leab Gebre-Egziabher (; 5 May 1936 – 20 February 2012) was an Ethiopian writer from Tigray Region. He is famous for pioneering the naturalist writing style in Amharic. His writing style was not constrained by the traditional Ethiopian wr ...
*
Baalu Girma
Bealu Girma ( am, በአሉ ግርማ, Be’ālu Girma; 22 September 1939 – 1984) was an Ethiopian journalist known for his criticism of prominent members of the Derg, in his book '' Oromay'' ("The End"). Girma disappeared in 1984, and it is wi ...
*
Bewketu Seyoum
Economics
*
Berhanu Nega
Berhanu Nega ( am, ብርሃኑ ነጋ; born 6 December 1958) is an Ethiopian politician who is serving as the current Ministry of Education (Ethiopia), Minister of Education of Ethiopia. He previously was the mayor elect of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia ...
Lawyers
*
Birtukan Mideksa
Birtukan Mideksa ( Amharic: ብርቱካን ሚደቅሳ; born 27 April 1974) is an Ethiopian politician and former judge who is serving as chairwoman of the National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) since 2018. She was the founder and leader ...
Obstetrician-gynecologist
*
Lia Tadesse
Lia Tadesse Gebremedhin ( am, ሊያ ታደሰ ገብረመድኅን; born 1976) is an Ethiopian politician and physician serving as the current Minister of Health since March 2020. Prior to her appointment, Lia served as State Minister of Hea ...
References
External links
Addis Ababa University official websiteInstitute of Ethiopian Studies and the Ethnological MuseumContact information for Addis Ababa University, and 28 Ethiopian institutions of higher education in the African Higher Education Database
{{Authority control
Universities and colleges in Ethiopia
1950 establishments in Ethiopia
Educational institutions established in 1950
Haile Selassie