History and organization
The first higher education institution in Tuzla was founded in 1958, it was the Higher Mining and Technical School founded at the request of the mines of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The first generation enrolled 158 students. In 1959, the Faculty of Technology was established as the first dislocated Faculty of the University of Sarajevo. The first doctoral dissertation was defended at this Faculty in 1962. The Higher School of Mining grew into the Faculty of Mining in 1960. The same year, the Higher Pedagogical School started working, enrolling 71 full-time and 236 part-time students in the first generation. The Pedagogical Academy was established in 1970 by growing from the Higher Pedagogical School. The Faculty of Electrical Engineering in Tuzla started operating in 1976. The founding of the Faculty of Medicine in Tuzla and the Faculty of Economics in Brčko, in 1976, was a crossroads from which we entered into the field of multidisciplinarity by gradually moving away from the predominantly technical profile of the faculties. After that, the establishment of the University became a necessity and a logical sequence of events, not only to continue the development of higher education but also to ensure further cultural and social transformation of the most populous region of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The establishment of new faculties created the preconditions for the establishment of the University. The establishment was preceded by the constitution of the Association of Higher Education and Research Institutions in the Region of Northeast Bosnia in 1972 and the Consortium for the Development of Higher Education and Research activity in Tuzla. The Initiative Board for the establishment of the University was appointed with 104 members and the president, academician, Ismet Mujezinović by the decision of the Assembly of the Municipality of Tuzla in April 15, 1975. The agreement on joining the University was signed on November 18, 1976 in Sarajevo, and the ceremony regarding the beginning of the University work was held on December 18 in Tuzla.
The war that lasted from 1992-1995 did not interrupt the work and development of the University of Tuzla. Since June 1992, the Faculty of Economics in Brčko has been operating with its headquarters in Tuzla. A significant year in the development of the University of Tuzla is certainly 1993, when, in the midst of the war, by the Decision of the Tuzla District Assembly, the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences was established by growing from the Pedagogical Academy and the Faculty of Special Education, which in 2004 changed its name to today’s Faculty of Special Education and Rehabilitation.
The Academy of Dramatic Arts (theater, film, radio and television) was founded in December 1998. In September 1999, the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering was divided into two parts: the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and the newly established Faculty of Mechanical Engineering.
On the September 22, 1999 University of Tuzla entered the new phase of development when the Assembly of Tuzla Canton passed the Law on the University of Tuzla, which established the Public Institution University of Tuzla, which included eight faculties, one Academy and the Student Center in Tuzla. By this act, the University of Tuzla has laid its foundations on new foundations and has the status of a legal entity, while its organizational units do not have it.
By this act, the University of Tuzla lays its foundations and acquired the status of a legal entity, while its organizational units do not have it.
Since then, the University has gained new momentum in its development. The Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences was the core from which the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics was established in 2002 by separating a group of related departments (biology, physics, chemistry, mathematics and geography) and the Faculty of Physical Education and Sports grow from the Department of Physical Education into a separate faculty. These changes were a reflection of the existing social needs to which the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and the University adapted.
The two youngest faculties at the University of Tuzla, the Faculty of Pharmacy and the Faculty of Law, were founded in 2004.
Along with the establishment of new faculties, the development of the University continued in the form of establishing numerous new study departments at existing faculties and colleges, which introduced University into a new phase of development that should result in the formation of a critical mass of humanistic intelligence in Tuzla region, without which would be unthinkable including into contemporary global trends.
Everything that has been achieved so far has brought us closer to the model of a well-organized European university that is able, due to its quality, to sustain itself in any transformation of higher education in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Today, the University of Tuzla is an institution without which it would be impossible to imagine not only the city of Tuzla but the entire region.
The University of Tuzla organizes and performs the teaching process at 12 faculties and one Academy:
1. Academy of Dramatic Arts,
2. Faculty of Special Education and Rehabilitation,
3. Faculty of Economics,
4. Faculty of Electrical Engineering,
5. Faculty of Physical Education and Sports,
6 .Faculty of Pharmacy,
7. Faculty of Philosophy,
8. Faculty of Mechanical Engineering,
9. Faculty of Medicine,
10. Faculty of Law,
11. Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics,
12. Faculty of Mining, Geology and Civil Engineering and
13. Faculty of Technology.
As a part of the University, there is also a Student Center with accommodation capacity for about 500 students and a modernly equipped restaurant for their meals.