Ferdowsi University of Mashhad
| Dāneshgāh-e Ferdowsi-ye Mashhad | |
 |
|
| Established | 1949 |
|---|---|
| Endowment |
US$ 57.43 million |
| President | Prof. Mohammad Kafi |
| Students | 26,000 |
| Location |
 Mashhad, Iran
|
| Website | www.en.um.ac.ir/ |
Ferdowsi University of Mashhad (FUM) (Persian: دانشگاه فردوسی مشهد) is a university in Northeastern Iran named after the great epic poet Ferdowsi who is the author of Shahnameh. The FUM campus is in Mashhad, the capital city of the Razavi Khorasan province, which is most famous and revered for housing the tomb of Imam Reza, the eighth Shia Imam. The university was established in 1949 with the title of Razavi University, making it the fourth oldest major university in Iran in the modern sense (there are however other academic collages established before (e.g. West Minster Medical College before Urmia University). FUM offers 180 bachelors, masters, and Ph.D. programs to 26,000 international and local, male and female students studying under about 900 faculty members with the aid of 2500 staff employees. Foreign students especially from Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan and Iraq make the university a popular institution in attracting non-Iranian students so that the university could be ranked first in Iran amongst other universities in recruiting foreign students, after the efforts made during the presidency of Ahmadinejad who declared Mashhad as "Iran's spiritual capital".
Georgetown University of Washington, D.C. (the oldest Catholic and Jesuit institution of higher education in the United States) helped Ferdowsi University of Mashhad toward its goal of becoming an upgraded university - the effort that was stopped over more than three decades after the Islamic Revolution of Iran in 1979. The university has been described as a good and big campus with weak connection to other institutions. and a world ranking of 1091 (in terms of academic performance).
The university was established in 1949 and used the title Razavi University (the term “Razavi” refers to Imam Reza holly shrine in Mashhad) and then Mashhad University. After Ferdowsi's tomb was opened again on April 30, 1968 following renovation and retrofitting, Mashhad University named Ferdowsi University on 1974; however after the Islamic Revolution, Ferdowsi University was renamed Mashhad University and recently it is called Ferdowsi University of Mashhad again.
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