Which clandestine Warsaw school did Marie Curie attend?

Marie Curie attended the clandestine Flying University in Warsaw. The institution offered higher-level lessons in Polish, including to women who were barred or restricted from ordinary university study under Russian rule.

The Flying University operated through shifting private locations, helping students avoid official repression and censorship. Curie studied there while also working as a tutor and continuing her scientific education independently. She later gained practical laboratory experience at Warsaw’s Museum of Industry and Agriculture.

The name can cause confusion because “Flying” referred to the university’s constantly changing meeting places, not to aviation. It was also sometimes translated as “Floating University.” In 1891, Curie left Poland for Paris, where she studied physics, chemistry, and mathematics at the University of Paris and began the research that made her famous.