Tomas Bata University in Zlín

Opened on 1st January 2001, the Tomas Bata University in Zlín (TBU) is a leading educational, scientific and research institution in the Zlín Region. Professor Petr Sáha has been elected its first rector. Named after the founder of the Zlín shoemaking factory, the university has a Board of Governors headed by his son Tomáš John Baťa (Tomáš Baťa Jr.) Applicants have a chance to choose from a range of study programmes offering good career prospects and offered by the establishment's four faculties: the Faculty of Technology focusing on technical and technological education; the Faculty of Management and Economics concentrating on economic education; the Faculty of Multimedia Communications, the only faculty of its kind in the Czech Republic, which produces future specialists in such fields as the marketing and social communications and multimedia and design. On 1st January 2006 a fourth faculty, the Faculty of Applied Informatics, was opened. Preparations are under way for the opening of a fifth faculty focusing on humanities. The University Institute ensures the development of a new orientation involving health care studies and humanities (linguistic and pedagogical studies) at the university. The Innovation Centre, a department of the University Institute, has been solving strategic projects of application research conducted to the benefit of the region. The university's principal objective is to become an internationally respected institution producing self-confident and creative graduates obtaining a top-quality professional qualification and able to communicate with the rest of the world. With this in mind, the university has been developing diverse forms of international cooperation. In the near future English is to become a language on a par with Czech at the Tomas Bata University in Zlín. The establishment has introduced a unified credit system compatible with the ECTS European Standard to evaluate the results of its undergraduates. In addition to a degree, the graduates from the university obtain a Diploma Supplement in English, recognized throughout Europe.

The Jižní Svahy Complex

In June 2004 the Tomas Bata University celebrated the opening of the Jižní Svahy University Campus comprising new lecture halls and classrooms, an Internet study room, a refectory as well as a gym, a muscle-conditioning gym and outdoor sports grounds.

The Congress and University Centre

Preparations are under way for the construction of a new library to form part of the Congress and University Centre. A renowned studio led by the Zlín-born Prof. Eva Jiřičná has designed the architectural conception of the facility. The centre is intended to meet not only the needs of the university, but also of the town of Zlín and the region as a whole.