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The Summer University (SUN) of CEU aims to contribute to the growth of new knowledge globally by offering high-level, research based courses for the most gifted, research oriented, young academics and professionals. Our courses are designed to assist the development and refinement of participants' research and policy agenda, as well as the integration of teaching this agenda with innovative research.

While previously SUN was aimed almost exclusively at junior faculty from Central and Eastern Europe and countries of the former Soviet Union, we now encourage young faculty, postdoctoral fellows and advanced doctoral students worldwide to participate in our summer school. Scholarships will be made available for those in need of financial assistance on an academic merit basis with continued preference for applicants from post-communist countries and emerging democracies.

SUN courses aim to open up new perspectives and generate new knowledge in cross-disciplinary and cross-national inquiry into currently relevant issues of cutting-edge research.

The program utilizes CEU's recognized regional expertise and our wider network, involving internationally acclaimed faculty worldwide, creating a space for mutually enriching dialogue between our regional and western scholarship. The teaching teams' joint expertise is shared with participants in a comparative framework during the summer courses.

To multiply the impact of CEU's mission, the SUN program was launched in1996. Since the inception of the program, the nine summer schools held so far hosted 169 courses taught by approximately 1,200 resource persons. SUN received over 15,000 applications out of which more than 4,600 were accepted.

Participants have been accepted into the program from 92 different countries ranging from East and Central Europe and the former Soviet Union to countries of Asia, Africa, North America and South America. 87% of the participants came from our region, 5% from non-regional new democracies, and 8% from other countries. The majority of participants are junior faculty and researchers; the rest of the participant body is Ph.D. students and professionals such as government officials, NGO workers, etc.

Resource persons have come to teach courses from 52 different countries so far. 44% of faculty were from the region, 56% from Western Europe, America, Canada, Australia, Israel and Japan, etc.

In the first seven years of the program SUN offered both academic and training courses ranging from general survey to advanced, in-depth courses. From 2004 the focus shifted towards high-level, research based, innovative courses, with a possible interest in the exploration of the policy implications of the research issues as well. This change is in line with the university’s efforts to establish itself as a research-intensive university and wish to be increasingly involved in creating and disseminating new knowledge gained through innovative research.

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