Tel Aviv University

Tel Aviv University (TAU; אוּנִיבֶרְסִיטַת תֵּל אָבִיב, Universitat Tel Aviv, جامعة تل أبيب, Jami’at Tel Abib) is a public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Located in northwest Tel Aviv, the university is the center of teaching and research of the city, comprising 9 faculties, 17 teaching hospitals, 18 performing arts centers, 27 schools, 106 departments, 340 research centers, and 400 laboratories. It is ranked 7th in the world by PitchBook data index.

Tel Aviv University originated in 1956 when three education units merged to form the university. The original 69 ha campus was expanded and now makes up 89 ha in Tel Aviv's Ramat Aviv neighborhood.

History
TAU's origins date back to 1956, when three research institutes: the Tel Aviv School of Law and Economics (established in 1935), the Institute of Natural Sciences (established in 1931), and the Academic Institute of Jewish Studies (established in 1954) – joined to form Tel Aviv University. Initially operated by the Tel Aviv municipality, the university was granted autonomy in 1963, and George S. Wise was its first president, from that year until 1971. The Ramat Aviv campus, covering an area of 170 acre, on top of the depopulated and razed Palestinian village of Sheikh Munis, was established that same year. Its succeeding presidents have been Yuval Ne'eman from 1971 to 1977, Haim Ben-Shahar from 1977 to 1983, Moshe Many from 1983 to 1991, Yoram Dinstein from 1991 to 1999, Itamar Rabinovich from 1999 to 2006, Zvi Galil from 2006 to 2009, Joseph Klafter from 2009 to 2019, and Ariel Porat since 2019.

The university also maintains academic supervision over the Center for Technological Design in Holon, the New Academic College of Tel Aviv-Yafo, and the Afeka College of Engineering in Tel Aviv. The Wise Observatory is located in Mitzpe Ramon in the Negev desert.

Academic units


Faculties
 * Katz Faculty of the Arts
 * Fleischman Faculty of Engineering
 * Sackler Faculty of Exact Sciences
 * Entin Faculty of Humanities
 * Buchmann Faculty of Law
 * Wise Faculty of Life Sciences
 * Faculty of Medicine (formerly the Sackler Faculty of Medicine)
 * Gordon Faculty of Social Sciences
 * Boris Mints Institute
 * Coller School of Management

Independent schools
 * Berglas School of Economics
 * Porter School of Environmental Studies
 * Buchmann-Mehta School of Music
 * David Azrieli School of Architecture
 * Goldschleger School of Dental Medicine
 * Miller School of Education
 * Shapell School of Social Work
 * TAU International (formerly the School for Overseas Students)
 * Sagol School of Neuroscience

Institutes and centers
Tel Aviv University has over 130 research institutes and centers.

The Lowy International School– English-taught programs
The Lowy International School (formerly known as TAU International) affords thousands of students from across the globe the opportunity to study at Tel Aviv University. All Lowy International School programs are conducted in English.

Programs include Semester or Year Abroad, Degree Programs, and Specialized Programs, such as the International LL.M at the Faculty of Law. Students in the Undergraduate or Semester Abroad Programs are given the option of housing at the Einstein Dorms, just outside the university.

Undergraduate programs:
 * B.S. in Electrical and Electronics Engineering via the International Engineering School
 * International B.A. degree in Liberal Arts and Humanities

Graduate programs:
 * M.A. in Political Science (Leadership, Communications and Elections)
 * M.A. in Security and Diplomacy
 * M.A in Middle Eastern Studies
 * Archaeology and History of the Land of the Bible
 * Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages
 * International Program in Conflict Resolution and Mediation
 * M.A. in Social Work with specialization in Crisis and Trauma Studies
 * M.P.H. in Emergency and Disaster Management
 * M.A. in Environmental Studies
 * Sofaer Global MBA
 * Kellogg Recanati MBA
 * M.A. in Migration Studies
 * International LL.M.

Medical school:

Within the Sackler Faculty of Medicine, there is a four year, English speaking Doctor of Medicine program which prepares students from North America for residencies in the United States and Canada. The program has a track record of excellent residency matches which far exceeds most international medical school, although as of 2022, all Israeli medical schools have been instructed to cease their programs for foreign medical students to provide more places for Israeli medical students.

In May 2007, New York University and Tel Aviv University approved a plan to establish an NYU Study Abroad Campus in Israel based at Tel Aviv University.

Rankings
In 2024 QS World University Rankings ranked Tel Aviv University 214th in the world, making it the highest ranked university in Israel. In 2016, its subject rankings were: 202nd in Arts and Humanities, 295th in Engineering and Technology, 193rd in Life Sciences and Medicine, 208th in Natural Science, and 240th in Social Sciences and Management.

The Center for World University Rankings ranked Tel Aviv University 81st in the world and third in Israel in its 2016 CWUR World University Rankings. They have also ranked it as 56 in 2012.

The Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2019 placed Tel Aviv University at 189th in the world. The ratings reflect an overall measure of esteem that combines data on the institutions' reputation for research and teaching.

In 2016 QS World University Rankings ranked Tel Aviv University 22nd in the world for citations per faculty, which is the indicator that measures a university's research impact. This makes Tel Aviv University the leading university in Israel in terms of research.

In 2015 the Academic Ranking of World Universities gave Tel Aviv University the following subject rankings: 20th in Computer Science, 51–75 in Mathematics, 76–100 in Physics and 76–100 Economics/Business. In 2016 it was ranked as 51–75 in Engineering.

From the year 2007 until 2018, Tel Aviv university ranks as 35th in the world in Computer Science according to CSRankings, the same rank as Harvard and the second-highest ranked in Israel.

As of 2021, it is ranked as the 191st best university in the world by THE World University Rankings, 230th by the QS World University Rankings and in the 151–200th bracket by the Shanghai Rankings

In 2022, PitchBook Data ranked Tel Aviv University 7th in the world in terms of number of alumni who have founded venture capital backed companies, the highest out of any University outside the United States.

Relations with other universities
Tel Aviv University offers special programs of Jewish studies to teachers and students from the United States, France, Brazil, Argentina and Mexico. The programs are in English.

The Tel Aviv University Faculty of Law has exchange agreements with 36 overseas universities, including: University of Virginia, Cornell University, Boston University, UCLA, Bucerius (Germany), EBS (Germany), McGill (Canada), Osgoode Hall (Canada), Ottawa (Canada), Queens University (Queens), Toronto (Canada), Bergen (Norway), STL (China), KoGuan (China), Tsinghua (China), Jindal Global (India), University of Hong Kong, Singapore Management University, Stockholm University (Sweden), Monash (Australia), Sydney (Australia), Sciences Po (France), Seoul (South Korea), Lucern (Switzerland), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Bocconi (Italy) and Madrid (Spain).

The Coller School of Management has exchange agreements with over 100 overseas universities. The Coller Exchange Program is open to MBA/MSc/MA students and qualified professionals. The school offers a wide variety of courses for its visiting students in strategy, entrepreneurship, finance-accounting, marketing, organizational behavior, decisions and operations research, technology and information systems. The program also offers courses from other TAU schools on Israeli Culture, History, Economics and more.

In 2013, Tel Aviv University and Ruppin Academic Center jointly created a study center at the Mediterranean Sea, where students will undertake advanced studies of issues impacting the coastal environment and its resources.

International cooperation
In Germany, Tel Aviv University cooperates with the Goethe-University in Frankfurt/Main. Both cities are linked by a long-lasting partnership agreement.

Publications

 * Tel Aviv (journal), peer-reviewed international journal of archaeology in the Levant and the history and culture of Near Eastern civilizations, with a focus on biblical and protohistoric periods and also dealing with the classical and prehistoric periods

Faculty


Notable faculty members (past and present) include:
 * Joseph Agassi, philosopher
 * Yakir Aharonov, physicist
 * Noga Alon, mathematician
 * Yitzhak Arad, historian
 * Karen Avraham, geneticist
 * Shlomo Ben-Ami, historian, former Minister of Foreign Affairs
 * Yoav Benjamini, statistician
 * Ziva Ben-Porat, literary theorist, writer, and editor
 * Joseph Bernstein, mathematician
 * Silvia Blumenfeld, curator of the fungi collection
 * Athalya Brenner, feminist Biblical scholar
 * Daniel Chamovitz, biologist
 * Guy Deutscher, physicist
 * Yoram Dinstein, international law professor emeritus and former president of Tel Aviv University
 * Uzi Even, chemist and political activist for LGBT rights
 * Margalit Finkelberg, historian and linguist
 * Israel Finkelstein, archaeologist
 * Yisrael Friedman, historian
 * Raphael E. Freundlich, Biblical studies and Latin
 * Ehud Gazit, nanotechnologist, chief scientist – ministry of Science
 * David Ginzburg, mathematician
 * Bob Griffin (born 1980), basketball player and English Literature professor
 * Daphna Hacker, lawyer
 * Sylvie Honigman, senior lecturer in ancient history
 * Benjamin Isaac, historian
 * Joshua Jortner, physical chemist
 * Shoshana Kamin, mathematician
 * Aryeh Kasher, historian
 * Asa Kasher, philosopher and authority on Ethics, author of IDF's Code of Conduct
 * David S. Katz, historian
 * Joseph Klafter, chemical physics, the eighth president of Tel Aviv University
 * Shaul Ladany, industrial engineering
 * Fred Landman, semanticist
 * Zvi Laron, pediatric endocrinologist
 * Orna Lin, lawyer
 * Raphael Mahler, historian
 * Yossi Matias, Computer Scientist
 * Vitali Milman, mathematician
 * Moshé Mizrahi, Oscar-winning film director
 * Baruch Modan, oncologist
 * Yuval Ne'eman (1925–2006), physicist, former minister of Science and Technology
 * Abraham Nitzan, chemical physicist.
 * Kennedy Otieno, criminologist
 * Ariel Porat, legal scholar and president of Tel Aviv University
 * Itamar Rabinovich, former Israeli ambassador to the United States and former president of Tel Aviv University
 * Aviad Raz, sociologist
 * Tanya Reinhart (1943–2007), linguist
 * Amnon Rubinstein, former Dean of Law, also former Education minister
 * Ariel Rubinstein, economist
 * Joseph Sadan, emeritus professor, Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies
 * Pnina Salzman, pianist and piano pedagogue
 * Shlomo Sand, historian
 * Leon Schidlowsky, composer
 * Milette Shamir, scholar of American literature and vice president of Tel Aviv University
 * Anita Shapira, historian
 * Micha Sharir, mathematician
 * Edna Shavit, drama
 * Margot Shiner, gastroenterologist
 * Joshua Sobol, playwright, writer, and director
 * David Soudry, mathematician
 * Carlo Strenger psychologist, philosopher
 * Leonard Susskind, physicist
 * Boris Tsirelson, mathematician
 * Jacob Turkel, Israeli Supreme Court Justice
 * Lev Vaidman, physicist
 * Avi Weinroth, lawyer
 * Paul Wexler, linguist
 * George S. Wise, first president of the university (1963–1971)
 * Moshe Wolman, neuropathologist
 * Amotz Zahavi, biologist
 * Moshe Zviran, Dean of the Coller School of Management

Alumni

 * Carmela Abraham, neuroscientist and Alzheimer's disease researcher
 * Zvi Arad (1942–2018), mathematician, acting president of Bar-Ilan University, president of Netanya Academic College
 * Dan Ariely, author and academic
 * Shai Avivi, actor
 * Fouad Awad, theatre director
 * Lucy Ayoub, actress and television host
 * Alon Bar, award-winning filmmaker
 * Daphne Barak Erez, current Supreme Court of Israel justice
 * Mohammad Barakeh, Knesset member and leader of Hadash
 * Rebecka Belldegrun (born 1950), ophthalmologist and businesswoman
 * Shlomo Ben-Ami, historian, former Minister of Foreign Affairs (Labor)
 * Yochai Benkler, co-director of the Berkman Center, Harvard Law School
 * Aluf Benn, editor-in-chief of Haaretz
 * Avishay Braverman (born 1948), Knesset member and president of the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
 * Shimshon Brokman (born 1957), Olympic sailor
 * Moran Cerf (born 1977), neuroscientist, professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University
 * Nili Cohen (born 1947), professor and legal expert
 * Ran Cohen, former Minister of Housing (Meretz)
 * Orna Donath (born 1976), academic and activist
 * Arie Eldad, former Knesset member (National Union (Israel))
 * Israel Eliashiv, former Israeli Ambassador to Singapore
 * Dana Erlich, Israeli Ambassador to Ireland
 * Nancy Ezer, author and professor of Hebrew at UCLA
 * Yael S. Feldman, Abraham I. Katsh Professor of Hebrew Culture and Education and professor of Hebrew and Judaic studies at New York University
 * Ari Folman, filmmaker (Director of Waltz with Bashir)
 * Tal Friedman, comedian, actor, and musician
 * Amir Gal-Or, founder of the Infinity Group
 * Zvi Galil (born 1947), computer scientist, mathematician, and president of Tel Aviv University
 * Benny Gantz, Chief of General Staff of the Israel Defense Forces.
 * Lior Geller, Academy Award and Emmy Award nominated filmmaker and Guinness World Record holder
 * Dan Gillerman, former Israeli Ambassador to the UN, and vice-president of the 60th UN General Assembly
 * Bob Griffin (born 1950), basketball player and English Literature professor
 * Tamar Halperin, harpsichordist, pianist and musicologist
 * Tzachi Hanegbi, member of Knesset, former minister of Internal Security (Likud and Kadima)
 * Rafael Harpaz, Israeli Ambassador to the Philippines
 * Michael Harris, academic
 * Avi Hasson, current Chief Scientist of the Ministry of Economy
 * Zvi Heifetz, former Israeli Ambassador to the United Kingdom
 * Ron Huldai, current mayor of Tel Aviv
 * Benjamin Isaac, historian
 * Moshe Kam, 49th President of IEEE and Dean of the Newark College of Engineering
 * Moshe Kaplinsky, Deputy Chief of the IDF General Staff
 * Efraim Karsh, historian
 * Rita Katz, terrorism analyst
 * Etgar Keret, writer
 * Dov Khenin, political scientist and Knesset member Hadash
 * Joseph Klafter, chemical physics professor, the eighth president of Tel Aviv University
 * Yosef Lapid, former Israeli vice premier, Minister of Justice and founder of the Shinui party
 * Amos Lapidot (1934–2019), fighter pilot, 10th commander of the Israeli Air Force, and president of Technion – Israel Institute of Technology
 * Peretz Lavie (born 1949), expert in the psychophysiology of sleep and sleep disorders, 16th president of the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Dean of the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine
 * Keren Leibovitch, champion Paralympic swimmer
 * Hanoch Levin (1943–99), dramatist, theater director, author and poet
 * Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, former Israeli Chief of Staff and Minister of Tourism and Transportation
 * Yossi Matias, computer scientist and Google executive
 * Moni Moshonov, actor and comedian
 * Yitzhak Mordechai, former Israeli Minister of Defense and Transportation
 * Natasha Mozgovaya, journalist
 * Abraham Nitzan, chemical physicist
 * Sassona Norton, sculptor
 * Daniella Ohad Smith, design historian
 * Yitzhak Orpaz-Auerbach, author
 * Mazi Melesa Pilip, Ethiopian-born American politician
 * Ophir Pines-Paz, former Interior Minister (Labor)
 * Ariel Porat (born 1956), president of Tel Aviv University
 * Gideon Raff, director and screenwriter, creator of the award-winning Israeli TV series Prisoners of War, adapted into Homeland
 * Haim Ramon, former Minister of Health and Justice (Labor and Kadima)
 * Ilan Ramon (1954–2003), first Israeli astronaut
 * Yoram Raved, attorney
 * Daniel Reisner, former Head of the International Law Branch of the IDF Legal Division
 * Elie Rekhess, historian of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and faculty of Northwestern University
 * Gideon Sa'ar, Knesset member and Minister of Interior Affairs (Likud)
 * Areej Sabbagh-Khoury, sociologist
 * Anat Schwartz, filmmaker
 * Hanoch Senderowitz (born 1963), Israeli chemist
 * Hamutal Shabtai, novelist
 * Ron Shachar, professor and researcher
 * Simon Shaheen, musician
 * Silvan Shalom, former minister of Finance and Foreign Affairs (Likud)
 * Ayelet Shaked, Israel's former Minister of Justice and current Minister of Interior (Yamina)
 * Adi Shamir, cryptographer, co-inventor of the RSA cryptosystem
 * Ariel Sharon (1928–2014), Prime Minister of Israel (Likud and Kadima)
 * Lou Silver, basketball player
 * Daniel Sivan, professor
 * Uri Sivan, physicist, professor, and president of the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology
 * Nahum Sonenberg, biochemist at McGill University
 * Michael Wolffsohn, author and former professor for contemporary history at the Bundeswehr University Munich
 * Yuval Tal, founder of Payoneer
 * Gadi Taub, historian, author, screenwriter, and political commentator
 * Hagit Messer Yaron (born 1953), electrical engineer, businesswoman, and president of Open University of Israel
 * Natan Yonatan (1923–2004), poet
 * Poju Zabludowicz, billionaire, philanthropist, and owner of Tamares Group
 * Bat-Sheva Zeisler, singer and actress
 * Misha Zilberman (born 1989), Olympic badminton player
 * Abdel Rahman Zuabi, former Supreme Court of Israel justice
 * Ghil'ad Zuckermann, linguist
 * Igal Vardi (born 1953), graphologist and psychologist

Sackler Family

Tel Aviv University has long held significant ties to the Sackler family as evidenced by several schools and many endowed chairs being in their honor. As more has become known of the role of members of the Sackler family in the global opioid crisis, many including the Israel Medical Association have called for the removal of the Sackler name from the Faculty of Medicine. As of November 2021, no members of the Sackler family served on the university's board of governors.