Erasmus Student Club - University - before exchange
University - Before exchange
The Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague (ICT) is the biggest educational institution of its kind in Central Europe. Its tradition of almost 200 years combined with progressive fields of study and good international reputation allows every student to get in touch with advanced technologies and make use of foreign student exchanges. It offers a prospect of a prestigious and highly remunerative professional career both in the Czech Republic and abroad.
The Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague, is comprised of four faculties:
- Faculty of Chemical Technology
- Faculty of Environmental Technology
- Faculty of Food and Biochemical Technology
- Faculty of Chemical Engineering
The individual faculties are the guarantors of the provided study programs, most of which are further divided into individual specialized fields of study. Classes within individual fields are guaranteed by the faculties or their individual departments. The Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague, has 29 departments specialized in different fields of chemistry.
University info
Courses taught at ICT
All courses available at ICT Prague are listed on the official website. The courses offered by ICT can be found in Course catalogue. The courses to be filled in the Learning Agreement can be chosen from this list.
The definitive schedule is arranged after arrival at the beginning of the semester directly with the respective department.
Czech as a foreign language
There will be two parallel Czech courses for beginners (2 x 50 minutes each) provided by the Department of Languages of the ICT (building B, 3rd floor), starting from 2nd week of the semester. The schedule will be designated at the beginning of each semester. The course is free of charge and you can obtain 1 ECTS credit for completing the course.
There are many Czech courses for foreigners available in Prague. Here is one useful website including information about Czech courses for foreigners provided by various language schools: Learn Czech.
Documents
Prior to submitting your application, you have to fill in the following forms: "Application Form", "Learning Agreement", and "Application for Accommodation". All these forms are available on the web site: Socrates / Erasmus (vscht.cz). The first two forms listed above have to be confirmed by your home university or the university sending you for studies at our Institute. Send your application to the Department of International Relations of the Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague either by mail or by fax. The "Application Form" and "Learning Agreement" shall be returned to you after confirmation (this applies to all foreign students without exception).
Students from non-EU countries shall receive a Letter of Acceptance in addition. The Letter of Acceptance is in Czech and it contains confirmation that your accommodation in Prague is guaranteed. You will submit this document as part of your application for a student visa.
History of the university
The history of the Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague, is derived from the beginnings of chemistry teaching in the Czech lands. Basic instruction in alchemy-related disciplines was provided as early as the 14th century, at the time of the foundation of Prague University in 1348. The disciplines of practical chemistry began to separate from alchemy in the course of the 15th and 16th centuries but it was only at the end of the 18th century that the teaching of natural sciences was included in classes for students of medicine.
At that time, some 60 iron and 80 glass works were in operation in the Czech lands. The oldest Czech chemical factory produced sulphuric and nitric acids, and highly developed textile production made use of bleaching and dying processes. This situation led to the foundation of the Prague Polytechnic. The instruction in two departments, mathematical and chemical, was launched in 1806. In addition to general chemistry, teaching at the chemical department also embraced practical chemistry focused on the glass industry, metallurgy, bleaching and dying. In the course of time, the range of subjects was extended with brewery, sugar industry, analytical chemistry, chemical analysis of minerals and technical gases, and other fields.
In the 19th century, a number of outstanding professors taught at the chemical department of the Prague Polytechnic. The first professor of chemistry was Karl Augustin Neumann. Professor Vojtěch Šafařík, the son of a prominent figure of the Czech National Revival, wrote the first Czech university chemistry textbook published in 1860 and he created the Czech chemical nomenclature by introducing specific Czech suffixes which clearly indicated different oxidation states. This nomenclature has been used until the present time.
An extraordinary increase in the standard of chemistry teaching and scientific research in the first third of the 20th century was closely linked with Professor Emil Votoček. He was the leading figure of the Institute of Chemical Technology, one of the seven sections of the Czech Technical University, which emerged from the reorganization of the Prague Polytechnic in 1920. Together with Jaroslav Heyrovský, professor of chemistry at Charles University who won in 1959 the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, Professor Votoček founded the journal "Collection of Czechoslovak Chemical Communications" which has been publishing scientific papers by Czech and foreign authors in English until today. At the time of professor Votoček's teaching, the Institute of Chemical Technology turned out a number of outstanding chemists, among them Professor Otto Wichterle, the inventor of soft contact lenses in the 1950s. Vladimír Prelog, professor at the ETH Zürich who won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1975, graduated from Prague's Institute of Chemical Technology in 1928, and he gained his PhD degree there several years later.
The Institute of Chemical Technology was detached from the Czech Technical University in 1952, turning into the current independent Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague.