Université Catholique de Louvain

Université Catholique de Louvain is Belgium's largest French-speaking university. The origins of the institution date back to 1425, which makes it the oldest Catholic university still active.

The University was based in Leuven (French name "Louvain"), 30 km from Brussels, until 1968, when a linguistic dispute was resolved by the following settlement:

The Dutch-speaking part, now named Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, would stay in Leuven (which is in the part of Belgium where Dutch is the recognised language), while the French-speaking part would move to a newly created town, Louvain-la-Neuve, 20 km south-east of Brussels.

Louvain (acronym UCL) educates nearly 25,000 students in all areas of studies, from theology to biology and from nuclear physics to law. It has educated a large part of Belgium's elite and is still considered, with its Dutch-speaking sister, as a centre of excellence in many fields. It is connected to Brussels by a fast train service, and the new town and camups is unusually architecturally interesting.