The Department of Education traces its inception back to four decades as the University of Jaffna was stepping into the fifty years of its educational service to the nation. The Department of Education was instituted in the Faculty of Arts on 15th October 1980 as the efforts of the scholars of the Northern Province and the leaders of Tamil community were realized, when the government decided to establish a faculty for teacher education at the University of Jaffna.

The first academic programme was inaugurated at the Department of Education with the first batch of 45 Post Graduate Diploma in Education students and five academic staff transferred from the University of Colombo. The Department of Education started its multifaceted educational programmes under the excellent guidance of late Professor. P. Chandrasegaram as the Head of the department. The department has been engaged in its traditional role of teaching and training the teachers and leaders of general education and allied occupations. It also is concerned with generating and disseminating knowledge through research and scholarship and with providing professional development services to the wider educational communities.