Decision has been made: CEU to launch all US-accredited degree programs in Vienna in 2019
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Budapest’s Central European University (CEU) will launch all US-accredited degree programs in Vienna in September 2019, the university said on Monday.
CEU said in a statement that it was making the announcement today in order to guarantee that it can recruit students in time for the beginning of the next academic year.
“Over the course of 20 months, CEU has taken all steps to comply with Hungarian legislation, launching educational activities in the US that were certified by US authorities. Nevertheless, the Hungarian government has made it clear it has no intention of signing the agreement that it negotiated over a year ago with the State of New York, which would ensure CEU’s operations in Budapest for the long term,” the statement added.
The case of CEU has been on the agenda for a while. They have declared that unless the university can emerge from its current legal limbo in Hungary by December 1, the new student intake for its American accredited masters and doctoral programmes will study at the CEU’s new campus in Vienna.
Despite all negotiation efforts, the decision has been made: CEU is moving its programmes to Vienna.
“CEU has been forced out,” the university’s president and rector said.
“This is unprecedented. A US institution has been driven out of a country that is a NATO ally. A European institution has been ousted from a member state of the EU,” Michael Ignatieff added.
He said that the Hungarian government had done an injustice toward its own citizens, the hundreds of Hungarians who work and study at CEU, and thousands of Hungarian alumni and their families.
CEU further said the excellence of its academic programmes has been certified by US education authorities and the Hungarian Accreditation Committee.
It called the “arbitrary eviction of a reputable university” a “flagrant violation of academic freedom” and “a dark day for Europe and a dark day for Hungary.”
The university further regretted that the Hungarian government had “refused to listen to the representations they received from members of the US Congress, the Office of the Governor of the State of New York, the Venice Commission, members of the European Parliament, leaders of universities around the world, over two dozen Nobel Laureates, but above all, the thousands of Hungarians from all walks of life who demonstrated peacefully and called for ‘free universities in a free country'”.
It said that CEU is registered in Austria to issue US-accredited degrees and will welcome all incoming students to its Vienna location in September 2019, adding that enrolled students will complete their studies in Budapest.
NotreDame University has no problem in Hungary. CEU probably decided not to cooperate with the law.