Number of New UZH Students Increases Slightly

Around 4,930 students will be starting their academic journey at UZH in the upcoming Fall Semester, representing a slight increase compared to 2023 (numbers as of 11 September 2024). UZH therefore expects the total number of students to equal or exceed the high level of the previous year. As enrollments continue to trickle in throughout the semester, the final student numbers won’t be available until the annual report is published next spring.

According to current figures, the proportion of female students will be on the same level as last year, hovering at around 59 percent. Meanwhile, almost 23 percent of students at UZH are from abroad. The most popular programs are in law, human medicine, psychology, informatics, business administration, finance and biomedicine.

Around half of students are enrolled in one of UZH’s two largest faculties – the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and the Faculty of Science – followed by the Faculty of Business, Economics and Informatics, the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Law, the Vetsuisse Faculty and the Faculty of Theology and the Study of Religion.

Two new offers have been introduced at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences this fall. The joint degree Master’s degree program in Teaching Ethics, Religions, Community is run by UZH and Zurich University of Teacher Education (PHZH). The program’s main goal is for students to explore questions of teaching ethics, religion and community as a school subject and help them acquire in-depth skills in subject-specific teaching and research. 

Another new offer is the interdisciplinary minor program in Comparative Linguistics at the Master’s level, which combines general linguistics/typology, Indo-European studies and psycholinguistics – a one-of-a-kind program in Europe. It is aimed at Bachelor’s graduates in the fields of history, sociology, geography, biology, computational linguistics, phonetics, social and cultural anthropology and theology.

The Faculty of Science has created a minor program in Financial Mathematics. It provides students with a basic academic education in financial mathematics and develops students’ methodical and scientific skills. The study program focuses on precise mathematical techniques using the latest statistical approaches based on machine learning and data sciences as well as programming skills.

Together with multiple partners and the university’s hospitals, the Faculty of Medicine is introducing a novel teaching-learning format for medical students. The module is designed to enable students from the various healthcare professions to learn about interprofessional collaboration and patient management on a case-by-case basis in everyday clinical practice.

Another new offer is the DSI Minor Digital Skills, which is run by an interdisciplinary network of instructors at the Digital Society Initiative (DSI) and explores the challenges of the digital transformation. The program features interdisciplinary teaching and learning settings that enable students to critically reflect on digitalization issues, promote understanding of different questions, approaches and methods, and develop their digital skills. The curriculum also includes ethical, legal and social issues associated with digitalization.