History and Mission | CES at UNC

The Center for European Studies (CES) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill advances understanding of the social, political, and economic events that shape contemporary Europe. The overarching mandate of the Center is to enhance undergraduate and graduate instruction in contemporary European studies, to promote scholarship and training for students and faculty from all disciplines and professional schools, and to stimulate institutional and public awareness of Europe’s economic, cultural, and political importance on campus, in North Carolina, and across the nation.

Two people sitting at the docks in Amsterdam.

Established in 1993, CES is one of only five in the nation to be designated as both a National Resource Center by the US Department of Education and a Jean Monnet Center of Excellence by the European Union. CES is consistently recognized among the top centers for European studies in the country for its innovative programming.

CES works with more than 28 core and 210 affiliate faculty across the university, providing support for curricular, research, and programmatic endeavors impacting more than 25,000 students annually. The Center is home to UNC’s undergraduate Contemporary European Studies Major (EURO), the only bachelor’s degree of its kind in the state. We also serve as the lead institution in the Transatlantic Masters Program (TAM), which offers three specializations in transatlantic studies in consortium with 10 universities across Europe and one in Turkey, offering an MA in Political Science from UNC, as well as degrees from our partners.

CES further sustains instruction by funding course development grants across UNC’s academic departments and professional schools. The Center advances scholarship on Europe through workshops, conferences, visiting speaker series, and travel and research grants to UNC faculty and students. CES offers prestigious Foreign Languages Area Studies (FLAS) fellowships to both undergraduate and graduate students to study contemporary Europe and both less and commonly taught European languages. Finally, we share resources and expertise about contemporary Europe and the EU with local, state, and federal government agencies, K-12 schools, community colleges, minority-serving institutions, private sector organizations, and the public at large. Our outreach initiatives serve more than 15,000 people every year.

A man advocating the National Health Service in the United Kingdom.

The Center for European Studies is committed to fostering an inclusive and equitable environment for all members of the UNC community, including students, staff, faculty, North Carolinians, and visitors. We strongly support the University’s dedication to diversity and equality of educational opportunity, articulated in the non-discrimination policy and by the University Office for Diversity and Inclusion.

We believe that a comprehensive approach to diversity is essential to upholding the University’s founding principles and motto of Lux Libertas (light and liberty). It is key to the protection of human rights and dignity, and vital to creative, engaged learning and scholarship.

Acknowledgement of support: This website has been funded with the assistance of the European Union and the US Department of Education. The contents of this website are the sole responsibility of the the Center for European Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and can in no way be taken to reflect the views of the European Union or the US government.

EU flag with the text co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

From 2017-2019, CES was a grant recipient of the Getting To Know Europe award from the Delegation of the European Union to the United States.