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A BRIEF HISTORY OF BAR-ILAN UNIVERSITY

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By the turn of the millennium, ten central buildings on the “new” campus grounds were in advanced stages of planning or construction, including facilities for brain research, music, psychology, Jewish philosophy and ethics, law, language studies, humanities, engineering, and interdisciplinary graduate studies.

The university’s master plan for 2001-2006 calls for $105 million of new construction, including new laboratories, dormitories, libraries, classrooms, concert halls, cafeterias, athletic facilities, hi-technology incubators, parklands and exhibition space. This makes Bar-Ilan University’s “new campus” the largest-ever educational construction venture in the history of the State of Israel.

Also in 2001, Prof. Moshe Kaveh was re-elected for a third term as university president, to oversee the continued rapid growth.

At the same time, Bar-Ilan University’s graduate student population grew by a phenomenal 48 percent. This was made possible by a sensational 420 percent increase growth in scholarship funds designated to support graduate study and research. The university plans to double the number of our Ph.D. students yet again, from 750 doctoral candidates at present, to 1,500 by 2005.

In 2001, the university opened a School of Engineering concentrating in computer and electrical engineering, with sub-specialties in signals processing, micro-electronics and electro-optics.

None of this growth would have been possible without the stalwart and generous support of Bar-Ilan University Friends worldwide. Global Board Chairmen Aharon Meir (1992-1994), Morris Green (1994-1997), Selig Wengrowsky (1997-1999) and Aharon Dahan (1999-today) were full partners to this expansion effort, along with the American Friends of Bar- Ilan University and other friends organizations around the world.

By the end of the century, the small college established by Prof. Churgin had grown to a full-fledged university of international repute, with close to 30,000 students in 40 academic departments and over 100 study tracks, scientific cooperation agreements with over 50 leading universities around the world, and 54,000 alumni. Bar-Ilan U. could credit important advances in cancer research, male fertility, pharmaceutical chemistry, research into Jewish law, and more.

1968. Israeli President Zalman Shazar and US Jewish leader Max Fisher
1971. Prime Minister Golda Meir
1976. President Efraim Katzir, Chief Rabbi Nissim, and Prof. Saul Lieberman
1977. President Chaim Herzog
1983. President Yitzhak Navon
1993. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
1978. Prime Minister Menachem Begin
1992. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir and President Ezer Weizman
1973. Nobel laureate Eli Wiesel
1976. British Prime Minister Harold Wilson
1985. US Vice President George Bush
1986. New York Mayor Ed Koch
1992. Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev
1994. US Vice President Al Gore, in Washington
1998. Supreme Court President Meir Shamgar, Singer Naomi Shemer
1999. Czech Republic President Vaclav Havel
2000. Bank of Israel Governor Prof. Jacob Frenkel
2001. Attorney General Elyakim Rubinstein, Author A.B. Yehoshua

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