were expelled from state universities for political reasons. After the fall of Communism in Poland in 1989, the university has flourished, quadrupling its student population and greatly expanding its campus. In 2010 the university was involved in a scandal concerning the granting of PhDs by departments that were not allowed to grant them, due to not having a sufficient number of academic staff. Celtic studies The Institute of English Studies at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin offers courses connected with Celtic cultures and languages as part of BA and MA courses in the Department of Celtic Studies. The department was founded in 1989. A student of Celtic Studies can choose between courses in Old English, Celtic History and Culture, Celtic Linguistics, and Irish and Welsh Literatures. BA students may opt for learning Irish and Welsh. There are also Celtic Days that have been taking place since 2004. The event has two parts, namely the academic (lectures, presentations, language workshops), and the artistic one (dance workshops, concerts). Rankings The university has had a steady advance in university rankings. In 2011, it was placed 8th among all Polish universities. Also in 2011, Wprost magazine ranked it 15th among humanity universities. Before that, in 2006 Newsweek Polska ranked the university 54th among all Polish universities. In 2011–12, the university's philosophy program was ranked first in Poland by the Polish Accreditation Agency, distinguished twice, receiving 9 million PLN total in grants that year as a result. Notable alumni and professors Pope John Paul II (Karol Wojtyła), the most famous person associated with the university. Wojtyła earned a licentiate in theology in July 1947, and successfully defended his doctoral thesis entitled Doctrina de fide apud S. Ioannem a Cruce (Doctrine of Faith in St. John of the Cross) in philosophy on 19 June 1948 at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum in Rome. Although his doctoral work was unanimously approved in June 1948, he was denied the degree because he could not afford to print the text of his dissertation (an Angelicum rule). In December of that year, a revised text of his dissertation was approved by the theological faculty of Jagiellonian University in Kraków, and Wojtyła was awarded the degree. He became a part-time teacher of philosophy at KUL starting in 1954, sharing his time between teaching in Lublin and doing his pastoral work in Kraków. After he became