Touro College was founded in New York City in 1970 by Dr. Bernard Lander as a Liberal Arts college. Since the 1970s, the expansion of the college has reached California, Nevada, Montana, Illinois, New Mexico, Israel, Russia, and Germany.

In 2001, Dr. Lander collaborated with Sara Nachama to establish Touro College in Berlin. The choice of Germany’s capital for the location of the new campus was based on two factors, the college’s profound Jewish history and the cohesion of communities in Berlin. Touro Berlin opened in the fall semester of 2003 with 18 students enrolled in the International Business program. This program eventually became the Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Business Management.

In 2005, Dr. Lander was inspired by a visit to the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin to set up a Holocaust Institute at Touro. The Lander Institute for Communication and Tolerance was founded in 2006 and welcomed its faculty for the Master of Arts (MA) in Holocaust Communication and Tolerance in the fall semester of 2007. The MBA program was introduced in 2010, with the B.A. in Psychology following in 2013. A new major, BSc Cybersecurity, will be offered in the fall semester of 2023.

During the tenure of Dr. Alan Kadish, the CEO of Touro University System, Touro College has undergone a major change in status, becoming Touro University. 

Our campus is housed in a historic Bauhaus villa with a long history in the beautiful district of Charlottenburg. Originally the home of the Lindemann family, the main house was designed by the famed German architect Bruno Paul. When the Nazis seized power in the 1930s, the Lindemann home at Am Rupenhorn became the official residence of Hanns Kerrl, the Reichskirchsminister (The Reich’s Church Minister). When the war ended in 1945, the house was handed over to the Allied Forces and was used as a learning center for the British Military. It was later handed back to the Berlin government and, in the 1950s, was used as a pedagogical and educational center. Touro acquired the property in 2003.