UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies

The UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies stands in Bloomsbury, London, on Taviton Street. It is part of University College London and specialises in Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe, Russia and Eurasia. The school teaches history, politics, literature, sociology, economics and languages of the region. More than 100 staff teach and research these subjects. Over 600 undergraduates and 200 postgraduates study there each year. The school was founded in 1915 by Robert Seton-Watson at King’s College London. Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, later President of Czechoslovakia, inaugurated it. It became independent in 1932, then merged with UCL in 1999. The building was opened in 2005 by Václav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic. The architects Short and Associates designed an environmentally friendly structure with solar panels and natural ventilation. Visitors find a large library of 357,000 volumes, unique in the UK for open-access research material. The library holds regional newspapers, films and specialist collections on languages, history and politics. The building itself features lecture halls, seminar rooms and study spaces. It also hosts public lectures, conferences and exhibitions. The school’s alumni include historians, diplomats and writers who have shaped understanding of the region.