page_title: University of Limerick
section_title: University campaign
hierarchical_section_title: University of Limerick / History / University campaign
caption_attribution_description: Plassey House, at the University of Limerick
context_page_description: The University of Limerick is a higher education institution in Limerick, Ireland. Founded in 1972 as the National Institute for Higher Education, Limerick, it became a university in 1989 in accordance with the University of Limerick Act 1989. It was the first university established since Irish independence in 1922, followed by the establishment of Dublin City University later the same day.
  UL's campus lies along both sides of the River Shannon, on a 137.5-hectare site with 46 hectares on the north bank and 91.5 hectares on the south bank, 5 kilometres from the city centre. It has over 11,000 full-time undergraduate students, including over 2,400 international students, and 1,500 part-time students. There are over 800 research postgraduates and 1,300 postgraduate students receiving instruction at the university. Its co-operative education programme gives all students an eight-month work placement as part of their degree, Ireland's first such programme.
  Following founding president Edward M. Walsh, Roger GH Downer, John O'Connor, and Don Barry, were presidents of UL from 1998 to April 2017.
context_section_description: According to founding president Edward M. Walsh, the mayor of Limerick applied for a Queen's College in the city in 1845; however, Belfast, Cork and Galway were established instead. In 1908 there was an attempt to link the National University of Ireland and Mungret College, about five kilometres from Limerick. Mungret offered bachelor's- and master's-level courses in the faculty of arts, with degrees conferred by the Royal University of Ireland, from 1888 to 1908. The university was dissolved in 1909 and replaced by the National University of Ireland, marking the end of tertiary education at Mungret. Degrees were awarded to students at Mungret College by the NUI from 1909 to 1912 to accommodate students who had matriculated at the Royal University.
  The campaign for a university in Limerick began in earnest by the late 1950s. The Limerick University Project Committee was founded in September 1959 by the mayor of Limerick in 1957, Ted Russell. Another supporter, Dermot Kinlen, was a High Court judge and the first state inspector general of prisons and places of detention. Russell and Kinlen received honorary degrees from the university in 2002.
caption: Plassey House, part of an estate pre-dating the university. Robert Clive was made 1st Baron Clive of Plassey in 1762 after defeating the Nawab of Bengal at the 1757 Battle of Plassey. The present president's office displays the university's ceremonial mace.
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