Fayoum University

Faiyum, 60 miles southwest of Cairo, is one of Egypt's oldest cities. It was known as Shedet to the ancient Egyptians, Krokodilopolis to the Greeks, and Arsinoe to the Romans. By that criterion, Fayoum University, a governmental institution formed in 1976 as a branch of the University of Cairo, is something of a novelty.

Since then, Fayoum University has grown steadily, with the addition of new specialties outside the basic schools of education and agriculture. The engineering faculty was established in 1981, followed by 14 more faculties across a variety of disciplines in the years since, with the key development in 2005 being the attainment of university status and the establishment of the schools of archaeology and medicine, which are centered on the 350-bed university hospital.

The present 50-acre campus in the city's El-Gamaa zone will be supplemented by new development on 100-acre land allotted to the university in the northern suburb of Kan Oshim. The tourism agency is building a new facility on Qaroon Lake to cater to one of Faiyum's most important activities, while hospital extensions are in the works.

Fayoum's high energy physicists have had the most success of the academic staff in breaking into internationally-recognized journals, while research activity also focuses on the city's location, with the establishment in 2013 of the Institute for Research into Strategic Studies in Nile Basin Countries and a two-year project, begun in 2017, to document Faiyum's "intangible heritage."

MORE INFORMATION:
World rank: 1315
Location: Faiyum, Egypt
Website: https://www.fayoum.edu.eg/english/