National University of San Marcos


Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos is the most important and respected higher-education institution in Peru. It consistently ranks among the top two universities in the country. The National University of San Marcos is a public research university in Lima, capital of Peru. Also known as the "University of Peru" and the "Dean University of the Americas", it is the first officially established and the longest continuously operating university in the Americas. Since its foundation, it was commonly referred as the "Royal and Pontifical University of the City of the Kings of Lima" until the Viceroyalty period and as of now, it is referred to as Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos or La Decana de América.
It is widely regarded as an influential institution of higher-education in the country. It consistently ranks among the top two universities in the country. Its main campus, the University City, is located in Lima. It was chartered on May 12, 1551, by a royal decree signed by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, which makes it the oldest officially established university in the Americas.
San Marcos has 66 academic-professional schools, organized into 20 faculties, and 6 academic areas. All of the faculties offer undergraduate and graduate degrees. The student body consists of over 30,000 undergraduate and 4,000 graduate students from all the country, as well as some international students. The university has a number of public institutions under its government such as the San Marcos Cultural Center and the Museum of Natural History of Lima.
It is also the only university in Peru with a Nobel Prize laureate among its alumni: Mario Vargas Llosa. San Marcos is also recognized for the quality of its curricular contents, a competitive admissions process, as well as for being a center of scientific research. Several Peruvian and Latin American influential thinkers, researchers, scientists, politicians and writers have studied there, which underscores San Marcos' leading role as an educational institution in the history of Peru and the world.

History

Oldest university in the Americas

San Marcos is considered the oldest university in the Americas. It was officially established by a royal decree on May 12, 1551, and since then it has operated without interruption. Hence, it is locally known as the Dean of the Americas. San Marcos also claims that according to the Archivo General de Indias, a Spanish repository of documents on the former colonies in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, there were no official Spanish records of any other university or higher-education institution before 1551.
Although the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo was founded in 1538, it was not officially recognized by Royal Decree until 1558, and, as many other universities in the Americas closed during independence wars and other political conflicts, it was closed due to the occupations of the Dominican Republic by Haiti and then the United States. The National University of Santo Domingo's founding Papal bull In Apostolatus culmine, was not officially recognized by the King of Spain at the time; hence making into an apocryphal document. The Peruvian institution also states that the document in question was discredited by Pope Paul III.

Organisation

Government

The university was originally headed by members of the clergy. During the Enlightenment, Bourbon reforms transformed it into a secular institution. Nowadays, the university is governed by:
The original faculties at San Marcos were Theology, Arts and Law; Jurisprudence, and Medicine were added later in the colonial period. The Faculty of Natural Sciences and the Faculty of Economics and Commerce were created in the mid-19th century. The Faculty of Science was subdivided by specialities in the 20th century. The Faculty of Theology was closed in 1935.
In the mid-1990s San Marcos' departments were grouped into four academic blocks. Nowadays, San Marcos' faculties are grouped into 6 academic areas.

Research

Throughout its history, the National University of San Marcos has significantly contributed to the scientific development of Peru. Currently, the National University of San Marcos is one of the few Peruvian universities that conducts research - only 10 out of over 80 universities. This is mostly due to the fact the national government has not properly financed research development in the last decades.
Regarding development of research activities of San Marcos, halfway through the 20th century, the Peruvian government issued provisions to place emphasis and create areas of scientific and student-led research. As a result, throughout these years many museums and institutes have been created within San Marcos to promote research in different areas of human knowledge. During the last years of the decade of 1990 and the beginning of 2000, the university renewed its research system through the assignation of specific projects to diverse academic departments.

Research centers and institutes

There are currently over 30 centers, units and institutes of research in San Marcos. Each one of these centers or institutes are grouped according to the academic area where they develop their research, therefore they are categorized in the following general areas: health sciences, basic sciences, engineering, economy-business, and humanities.
According to their area of study, the research centers have specialized museums and laboratories where they develop and display their work. Each institute also has their own publications where they present reports and results of the work of their researchers.

Notable alumni and academics

See also :Category:National University of San Marcos alumni and :Category:National University of San Marcos faculty
and Law of 1896 posing in front of department's water fountain