The UNED is the biggest public university in Spain
with some 240,000 students,
close to 1,500 professors,
more than 6,300 tutors
and 1,300 Administration and Services Staff,
who from the Central Office and Associated Centers
strive on a daily basis to support the student's march
towards the completion of their studies.
Courses offered by the UNED
include 28 undergraduate degrees,
11 combined undergraduate degrees,
75 Masters programs
and 19 Doctorate Programs,
all adapted to the European framework
and set up through the International Doctorate School,
founded with the aim of encouraging international interaction
and multi-disciplinary and transversal cooperation
among all its researchers.
Furthermore, the UNED boasts 550 of its own
Permanent Training programs,
aimed at bettering and updating personal knowledge,
aptitudes and capabilities.
14 language courses from the CUID,
the Online, Long-distance University of Languages;
more than 500 University Extension activities,
170 Summer Courses held throughout Spain
and the UNED Senior Program for those over 55.
Open UNED offers
a wide-ranging catalogue of open content
and University Access programs
for those over 25, 40 and 45 years old,
that allow people
who have never before had the chance,
to access higher education.
The UNED is able to offer so many courses
thanks to its organizational structure,
which is made up of 9 Faculties
and 2 Superior Technical Schools,
as well as 61 Associated Centers,
125 university classrooms
and more than 700 multimedia rooms
throughout the country,
where students can go
to seek support and tutoring.
What's more, the UNED
can be found in 14 countries on 3 continents,
with 12 Overseas Centers
and 6 classrooms for exams.
"Wherever you may be"
has been the UNED's hallmark
since it was founded in 1972
as a model of distance learning,
a formula repeated by many other universities today.
Since then, the UNED has developed technologically.
Long gone are materials sent by post
with text books and cassette tapes.
Today, students can follow the tutorials
on their mobile devices,
attend a class via video conference
and interact with digital whiteboards.
The UNED's educational methodology
is based on the combination
of long-distance and on-campus learning,
and supported by the use of state-of-the-art
educational technology,
which means that
a UNED student is never alone,
always having access to a large, online community
with numerous, online services at their disposal.
The IUED, University Institute of Long-Distance Learning,
is constantly working to improve
the quality of its long-distance learning
and to perfect its methodology.
At the UNED,
each student is the protagonist of their own education,
and it is precisely this protagonism
that is the focus of the European Higher Education Area,
which aims to train professionals capable of
responding to the challenges set by our knowledge-driven society.
With innovative, high-quality educational materials
and with the help of professors and tutors
at the Associated Centers,
UNED students have all they need
to get the best out of their studies
in the most flexible way possible:
at their own pace,
any time anywhere.
New technologies in the field of education
allow the UNED
to carry out
700,000 on-site exams every year,
all around the world and simultaneously.
This is thanks to the Virtual Mailbag,
the UNED's own exam management system,
devised to increase security and speed
in the control of on-site exams
and save the students waiting time.
When students identify themselves at an exam center,
they are given the corresponding exam,
the amount of time they have,
and the seat that has been designated to them.
At the end of the exam,
the papers are scanned, sent off to be corrected
and the results published.
A similar system allowed the UNED to become the first ever university
to examine Spanish soldiers,
who were on a UN Peace Mission
at the Lebanese military base, "Miguel de Cervantes".
The success of the experience has meant that other soldiers,
stationed in Kabul and Djibouti,
can finish their studies without having to wait to return home.
Equal opportunities
is another of the UNED's hallmarks,
as it adapts to the personal and working
commitments of each student.
More than 40 % of students with disabilities
studying university courses in Spain, do so at the UNED.
There to guarantee they have the same opportunities
are the UNIDIS technicians.
And more than 30 % of the UNED's students
assure that they wouldn't be able to study
in any other kind of university.
Furthermore, there is the University Studies Program,
carried out in Penitentiary Centers associated with the UNED,
which aims to increase the level of educational
and cultural learning among prisoners.
The UNED's Center of Gender Studies
coordinates and promotes teaching and research activities
linked to gender equality.
It sees equality as a key part of the education
in a university that was the first to have a female dean
and the only one to have had two women governors.
Research and the transfer of results to society
is the objective of any university.
The UNED boasts 102 research groups,
covering every area of knowledge,
from humanities to engineering.
A dozen agreements have been reached
to appoint chairs to businesses and institutions.
The aim is to join forces
and thereby advance the search for solutions
to society's current problems.
Fruit of adopting the concept of I+D+i,
the UNED receives around two and a half million euros a year
from innovative projects,
some of which are international.
International collaboration
is another of the UNED's priorities.
Each year it signs around 20 collaboration agreements
with universities and institutions around the world,
such as the Teacher's Training agreement with Ecuador
and the European Project ECO,
aimed at designing the MOOCs of the XXI century.
The UNED boasts numerous Services
that aim to offer the best possible public service,
such as the UNED's Library,
which has been awarded the 400+ European Stamp of Excellence,
or the institutional archive, e-Spacio UNED,
which gathers together the results
of all research and teaching activity
and is one of the top 100 in the world.
Furthermore, an effort has been made to bring together all resources
in a Digital Content Archive.
This archive contains all audiovisual files
generated by the CEMAV,
the UNED's Audiovisual Media Center.
Another of the services that the UNED offers
its students and graduates is the COIE,
or Work Orientation Center,
which with its pool of in-company training offers
aims to increase students' employability
or help reorient their professional careers.
A large number of sporting and cultural activities,
among which we can find some of the oldest,
such as the Visual Arts competition
and the Short Narrative Prize,
make the UNED a reference point in Spain's cultural landscape.
A University that is present
in both the national and international media,
thanks to its members' academic contributions,
and extremely active on the social networks.
With more than 235,000 followers
and 19 million online views,
it is the university to have uploaded the most videos in the whole of Europe.
Its website, with access to all its resources,
receives over 37 million visits a year.
All this can be added to the UNED's strong commitment
to sustainability, transparency
and social responsibility.
The UNED is a long-distance university, that is very much up-to-date
in its use of new technologies
applied to education,
and this allows it to be a borderless university,
the university of the future,
where knowledge moves faster than any other moving thing,
as can be read on the original shield.