Schiller was founded in 1964 by Dr. Walter Leibrecht as a study-abroad program for Americans living in West Germany. In 1969 the college relocated to Heidelberg.
Campuses
Tampa Bay
The main campus is located in Largo, Florida. The university's Administrative Headquarters and Office of Admissions are in Largo. The current president is Dr. Manuel Alonso-Puig. At one time it was located in Dunedin, Florida. By 2006, the university moved to East Bay Drive and then Ulmerton Road in Largo.
The Madrid Campus is located in a historic building on Plaza de la Republica Argentina in Northern Madrid. The Madrid campus specializes in International Business and in International Relations. In addition to US accreditation, the Madrid campus is recognized by the Comunidad de Madrid, allowing students to apply for "homologación."
Heidelberg
The Heidelberg campus was the first Schiller campus and the largest. For years the campus was located in the Villa Krehl in Bergstraße, but in summer of 2012 the campus moved to new facilities in the Bahnstadt. The address of the campus is: Zollhofgarten 1, 69115 Heidelberg, Germany.
Schiller first established a London presence in 1971, renting facilities in Birkbeck College. In 1978, an outer London campus in premises owned by the university was established at the historic Wickham Court in West Wickham, Kent. In 1981 the university acquired the former Royal Waterloo Hospital for Children and Women. In 2011 the UK announced tighter visa restrictions on international students, and as the university attracted 80-85% of its students from non-European Union countries it proved increasingly difficult to attract sufficient numbers of students. In response, in August of that year Schiller announced that it was closing its London campus and sold the site to the UK branch of the University of Notre Dame to provide dedicated student residence for its students in London. In 2015 Schiller established a partnership with the University of Roehampton which offers its students the possibility to an obtain the SIU degree, and after completion of a dissertation or thesis, a University of Roehampton degree.
Accreditation
Schiller International University is accredited by the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools. As of 2015 Schiller students can gain a double degree awarded by Schiller and the University of Roehampton in the United Kingdom, thanks to a bilateral agreement between both universities.
The university is approved for Federal and Veterans' training programs, and also offers a limited number of institutional awards to students—regardless of citizenship—based on need, academic performance, nationality, and grade level.