In 1926, one year after the establishment of college, the Department of Civil Engineering was formally founded.

After the foundation of People’s Republic of China, the government restructured the country’s higher education institutions in 1952. The Departments of Civil Engineering in Peking University and Yanjing University were merged into Tsinghua University and the department then had five divisions

From 1970, Tsinghua University admitted students directly from all backgrounds including workers, farmers and soldiers.

The Department of Civil Engineering was renamed to Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering in 1980 combining the Environmental Engineering specialties developed from Municipal Engineering.

In 1984, the Environmental Engineering was separated as an independent department, and the Department of Civil Engineering resumed its original name. In 1986, the specialty of Construction Management was created.

In 1986, the specialty of Construction Management was created.

In 2000, to promote the multi-discipline cooperation, the School of Civil Engineering (SCE) was formed on the basis of the Department of Civil Engineering and the Department of Hydraulic Engineering. Meanwhile, the Department of Construction Management was established from the original specialty of Construction Management in the SCE.

Today, the SCE has three National First-class Key Disciplines, Civil Engineering, Hydraulic Engineering and Construction Management, involving 17 research institutes and nine laboratories.