Milestones

Stavovské inženýrské učiliště (Estate Engineering Teaching Institute) in Prague was founded by the rescript of the Emperor Josef I of 18 January 1707 on the basis of a petition of Christian Josef Willenberg (1676-1731). 

According to the example of the Ecole polytechnique (1794) in Paris, the Institute was reformed in the years 1803-1806 to the Prague Polytechnic by František Josef Gerstner (1756-1823) putting the accent on a modern teaching of technical disciplines related to the developing industrialization of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia. Gerstner’s Polytechnic became the oldest technical school of this type in Central Europe.

In 1869, the Prague Polytechnic Institute was split into a Czech part and a German one on the basis of the Hasner Act.

From 1875, the Czech technical school bore the title C. k. Český polytechnický ústav (Emperor’s and King’s Czech Polytechnic Institute), and from 1879, C. k. Česká vysoká škola technická (Emperor’s and King’s Technical University). In parallel to the Czech Technical University, there was the German Technical University in Prague. The split of the Technical University by nations was of a great benefit to the teaching. The Czech Technical University prepared professionally capable technical intelligentsia, which got on key positions in Czech industry, trade, agricultural, transport and state administration.

After the creation of Czechoslovakia in 1918, studies of technical specialties achieved a great progress. Pursuant to the Small Act on Schools of 1920, České vysoké učení technické (ČVUT), Czech Technical University, was established in Prague, being an umbrella for a total number of seven independent Czech technical universities (of civil engineering, architecture and building construction, mechanical and electrical engineering, chemical technology engineering, special sciences, and trade), and the German Technical University. In the period between two world wars, the number of both home and foreign students increased. 

After 17 November 1939, ČVUT, together with other Czech universities, was closed by the German occupants.

After World War II, teaching at ČVUT in Prague began on 4 June 1945 as a continuance of the academic year 1939/40, and the German Technical University in Prague was cancelled. In this period, many teachers and students lost their lives, the university incurred innumerable material losses and was isolated from the development of technology and science in the world for several years. One of the consequences was, for example, that the reforms of studies prepared before the occupation and also construction of buildings at Dejvice, which began in 1925, remained unfinished.

The February 1948 resulted in Act number 58/1950 on Universities, which changed the contents of studies to follow the governing communistic ideology and constituted six specialised faculties of ČVUT (of mechanical engineering; electrical engineering; civil engineering; architecture; nuclear engineering; and transport), of the complex of which it separated some universities in the course of the 1950s (Vysoká škola chemicko-technologická /Chemical Technology University/, Vysoká škola zemědělská /Agriculture University/, Vysoká škola ekonomická /Prague School of Economics/.

After 1989, teaching at ČVUT has been modernised and structured studies of technical branches enable access to studies in other countries of the European Union. The teaching is made under the Bachelor, Master of Arts, and Doctor degrees curricula. ČVUT graduates find good job opportunities not only in the Czech Republic, but also abroad.

Modifications to Betlémská kaple (Bethlehem Chapel), the main meeting and ceremonial place of ČVUT, reconstruction of buildings at Dejvice and revitalisation of the building at Karlovo náměstí (Charles Square) were made.