The Federal University of São Carlos is a public institution,
linked to the Ministry
of Education (MEC) of Brazil. It was established in 1968 and started
its activities two years later, when it enrolled the first 93 students
for the courses offered in Materials
Engineering and Science baccalaureate. Currently there are 10 thousand
students (approximately 6.800 in undergraduate courses and 3.000 in
post-graduate courses) The University offers 37
undergraduate courses and 50 graduate courses
(20 in the Doctorate’s program and
30 in the Master’s degree program,
besides many specialization courses).
Since the very beginning of the institution´s activities, its
teaching staff (690 professors), stands
out on account of their high-level qualifications, with approximately
99% holding doctorates and masters degrees, the highest ratio among
all other federal institutions in the country. Moreover, nearly 98%
of the faculty members work full-time.
The university is located about the central area of the state of São Paulo, southeast region of Brazil. It has three campuses which are named
according to the local cities: São Carlos, Araras, and Sorocaba. The
main one is located in a vast area of 645 hectares within the limits
of the city of São Carlos, and has 137 thousand
square meters of constructed area.
The Araras campus, a very important research
center, situated about 94 km from São Carlos, offers undergraduate
courses in Agronomical
Engineering and Biotechnology.
The newly created campus of Sorocaba, where
sustainability, in a broad and deep sense, is the drive to all activities,
has a physical área of about 700 thousand square meters.
The campuses have all the necessary infrastructure for adequate operation
and functioning of University activities. There are more than 250 laboratories,
a Community Library
and sectorial branch libraries, ambulatories, theaters, amphitheaters,
auditoriums, sport gymnasiums, sport grounds with 8 courts and 2 swimming
pools, university restaurants, cafeterias and snack bars, 85 classrooms
and over 370 student living quarters.
The 31 academic
departments of the University are grouped in four academic centers:
Center of Biological
Sciences and Health, Center
of Exact Sciences and Technology, Center
of Education and Human Sciences and Center
of Agrarian Sciences.
At the international level, UFSCar is member of organizations such
as the Association
of Universities Montevideo Group; Association
of Portuguese Language Universities; Tordesillas
Group; International
Association of Universities; Columbus
cooperation program between European and Latin American higher education
institutions, and Organization
of the Iberian-American States for Education, Science and Culture.
To provide assistance to the international community, UFSCar has the
International Relations Office, a division of
the administrative sector, responsible for international contacts, reception
of foreign delegations or missions, and for planning, developing or
intermediating cooperation agreements with foreign institutions.
