Faculty of Science's 90th anniversary

The Faculty of Science is commemorating its 90th anniversary as a separate faculty of the University of Malta. The Faculty Board met to discuss business of the new faculty for the first time in 1915: the first dean was Sir Temi Zammit, Professor of Chemistry, who was later to serve as Rector of the University.

Science and mathematics had, of course, been part of the university curriculum from the inception of the university since these areas of study formed the basis of the professional courses in medicine and architecture. However, the disconnection of science and mathematics from other general academic areas and their unification in a separate faculty paved the way for consolidation of studies in these areas as specialist disciplines in their own right.

To celebrate this 90th anniversary, the faculty board, meeting under the chairmanship of Professor Alfred Vella, suspended its normal agenda to mark the occasion with the reading of a commemorative paper by Professor Stanley Fiorini, who, besides being a mathematician by profession, is also a distinguished historian. Among the persons invited for the occasion were the Rector and pro-Rectors, Registrar and also retired academic staff of the faculty.

Today, the Faculty of Science consists of seven departments: biology, chemistry, mathematics, physics, statistics and operations research, computer information systems and computer science and artificial intelligence. The faculty offers a four-year joint honours Bachelor of Science degree in two areas of study as well as postgraduate programmes, namely, Master's and doctoral (Ph.D.) degrees.