University College Cork

Founded in 1845, University College Cork (UCC) is a non-profit public higher education institution located in the large town of Cork, County Cork, overlooking the River Lee.

UCC is one of Ireland’s most prestigious universities. It boasts a vibrant, modern campus with an unsurpassed student experience in Ireland. A learning community where the student is at the heart of everything and the special relationship between student and lecturer is primary to the universitie’s unique ethos.

Originally named Queen’s College, Cork, the university was established to provide access to higher education in the Irish province of Munster (Ireland's the second city), and was named after Queen Victoria, along with two other Queen’s Colleges in Galway and Belfast.

The landscaped gardens and surrounds of UCC are known as ‘the quad’ and superstition holds that students crossing the quad before graduation risk bad luck and failure in exams.

Alongside the quad, the university is centered on its Aula Maxima – the Great Hall, which acts as the ceremonial and symbolic heart of the university. The Hall's design inspired by the great universities of the Middle Ages was the work of renowned Irish architects Thomas Deane and Benjamin Woodward.

UCC’s uniqueness is comprised of several threads, which when woven together create the fabric of an exceptional university experience. Those elements include its cosmopolitan character, diversity of student backgrounds, successful access programs, excellence in teaching, high academic standards, flexibility in the delivery of programs, high completion rates and levels of graduate employment, excellent sporting facilities and a broad diversity of societies and social activities resulting in over two thousand student led events per term.

UCC is the first University in the world to be awarded the esteemed ‘Green Flag’ award and remains the only Irish institution to be honored in this way. It was ranked the 4th in the world on the Global Green University Rankings including a ranking of second ‘greenest’ urban university campus in the world. 

Since 1908, UCC has grown exponentially, offering a research-led curriculum across 120 degree programs in humanities, business, law, architecture, science, medicine and more. With a student body of some 20,000, including 3,000 international students, UCC returned to being a university in its own right again in 1997, retaining its original name.

UCC’s alumni includes the prominent mathematician Professor George Boole who most famously invented Boolean logic, as well as the feminist and politician Mary MacSwiney.

Courses are offered in teaching period 1 (fall semester), teaching period 2 (spring semester), or teaching periods 1 & 2 (academic year).

Medicine, Arts, and Law were the three founding faculties when Queen's College Cork opened its doors to students in 1849. And today these are the most highly ranked academic specializations. 

Besides, 13 of UCC’s subject areas featured in the QS World University Rankings by Subject 2015 (up from 10 subject areas in 2014), including the pharmacy & pharmacology disciplines which were listed with the top 50 worldwide.