The European Union Center of Excellence and European Studies Center are constituent units of the University Center for International Studies (UCIS), identified by the United States Council on Learning as one of the exemplary international studies programs in the United States. The EUCE/ESC has responsibility for coordinating and developing scholarship, teaching, and community events related to Europe. The Centers do so in cooperation with academic departments, schools, and research units throughout the University. The Centers support development of new courses, sponsor lectures, symposia, and conferences with international participants, offer faculty and graduate student grants, and provide an intellectual community for students and faculty studying all aspects of contemporary and historical Europe.
Understanding the hopes and problems of the Europe and the European Union in the twenty-first century requires an awareness of the achievements and disasters that Europe has undergone in earlier centuries. It also requires an appreciation of how identities and cultures were established, how collective memory developed, and how history has shaped current political and economic issues in European Integration. Contemporary Europe can be best understood by expolring how history, culture, law, politics, and economics intersect. Two centers at the University of Pittsburgh, the EUROPEAN UNION CENTER OF EXCELLENCE and the EUROPEAN STUDIES CENTER encourage such interdisciplinary thinking--forming the EUCE/ESC.
