The Italian University System (1)

This post will be split into two since this is such a big topic to cover! So if you find that at the end of this post I finish in a rather inappropriate place to stop you might want to continue reading the next post which will be the continuation of this one.

Before I start this post about the Italian University system I forgot to mention in my last post that when I went to my estate agents to sign the contract they told us that although our contract was for 12 months (like most usually are) we could write to them 3 months before we left and then they would cancel the rest of our contract. That doesn’t sound very important but it means that since we only need the apartment for 9 months, we only have to pay for 9 months! (and saving money is what a student does best ;)). So that’s definitely worth asking about before you sign any contract! And obviously make sure you have the contract translated (if it is in Italian) before you sign it!

Now as promised… the Italian University system…

I come from Queen Mary University of London; the organisation there is really good but I wouldn’t say that it couldn’t be improved. However:

I have never appreciated my English University and its system so much until having experienced the Italian system! I can guarantee that you’re in for a shock at first!

At first I absolutely hated it! I thought it was illogical, unorganised and to be frank, very shoddy! However, one of the first things I learnt about Italy is the people really do take each day as it comes. Everything here is so relaxed and laid back (which is annoying at times!) but after a few days I began to like the experience (albeit not the system!) because it’s such a change from the hustle and bustle and stress of living in London.

Firstly, you have to sort out your own timetables. I can only speak for Queen Mary but I was so used to receiving my timetable and having selected my modules earlier on before the year started. I would only have to look at that one piece of paper that had been prepared for me and worked out ever so carefully so that my days were balanced. At the University of Bologna however, this is not the case. I suppose it promotes independence? But to be honest I think it’s a lot simpler to have the administration team of a university make the timetables?  But anyway, here you make your own. Most universities give you a minimum number of credits you must take during your semester/year here. Usually that’s 30 if you’re only staying for one semester and 60 if you’re staying for both.

You have a learning agreement which your home university gives you which you must fill in before you get here (which is pointless if you ask me!) by looking at information on the UNIBO Course Catalogue on the website. You have to bring this with you to your host university and amend it and get it stamped and sent back along with various other documents (which I will do a separate blog post on). I can almost guarantee you that you will have to amend your learning agreement. The University of Bologna for some reason does not update its websites for the next year until a few days before class begins so you might have subjects on your learning agreement that don’t even exist anymore. This happened to me! Also each home university will send its students away with some rules on which subjects they can take. For example:

-   I am only allowed to take classes that are taught in English

-  Some have to take the exact equivalent of classes they would be doing at their home university

-  Some aren’t allowed to do subjects they have already done at their home university

-  Some have to take a certain number of English/Italian classes

And the list could go on. So you will have to bear this in mind when choosing your classes and choose them very carefully so that you have the right number of credits.

I’ll take you through my experience now, which isn’t the best but don’t let it put you off because the moral is that everything was fine in the end and I am now registered on my classes and have worked out a timetable!

The conditions that my home university set out were:

1. You must take all classes in English.
2. You must have a maximum of 60 credits.
3. You must not take classes you have already taken or will have to take compulsorily in your last year.

As you can imagine, an Italian university does not have an extensive range of English taught classes, in fact I think there are about ten in total here. That as well as my restrictions meant that I was already very limited in choice. As I mentioned before one of the classes that the website had said was offered in English was subsequently taken out and this meant that my credits totalled 59!

The first thing I did was panic, I was emailing my home university with emails labelled urgent worried to death that I would have to take a class taught in Italian when I had absolutely no idea how to speak it, let alone understand a class and take an exam in it!

Thankfully, my home university (and I’m sure pretty much all home universities) was extremely understanding and extremely helpful! My Erasmus co-ordinator emailed me back saying that 59 was fine and that the minimum was not strict as long as it was pretty close. (NB: This what just what my university told me so it’s best to find out from your university what their policy is before you leave for your host institution!).

That problem was sorted, but unfortunately it wasn’t the only thing that caused an issue. I also wasn’t allowed to take subjects I had already taken or will have to take; honestly – this category applied to every single class with the exception of two.  

Again I emailed my home university who said that given my circumstances this was fine. A lot of other universities also had the same approach but as I said earlier, it’s worth double checking before you leave the country because it will save you a lot of hassle if you know what your university is realistically expecting.

This is important because you have to register for your classes in Italy (I’ll say a bit more about that later) and this has to be done by a certain date so if your university hasn’t okayed your module choices and you don’t register in time I assume that you can’t attend any?! (although I don’t know that for sure, in fact if I think about it, it’s probably the opposite, the international office could probably help you since Italians seem to be quite flexible so far).

That point has actually just reminded me of the ‘Welcome Talk’ that the Erasmus students had to attend right at the beginning when university started! (this blog will be a bit mixed up like this so it might be quite confusing to read, I hope not too confusing though, I’m just trying to be as helpful as possible and want to give you all the information so that you know what to expect so if I remember something I want to add it in. Must be the Italian system rubbing off on me!)

So in terms of the ‘Welcome Talk’ this is just a brief note to say that when I went to the talk the person speaking said everything in Italian! There were plenty of Erasmus students waiting patiently for her to stop and explain in English but confusingly that never happened. When ten minutes had passed a girl from behind me put up her hand and actually asked ‘can you do this talk in English?’ everyone was so thankful that we were all thinking the same thing as we were worried that they would expect us all to speak Italian or that they themselves spoke no English. Fortunately the woman handed over to a man who answered ‘Yes, we probably should have asked that to begin with’ (another example of the characteristics of the Italian system there!) so do not be alarmed if you get there and everything is in Italian, just ask them for the information in English J Quite unhelpfully though, the pack you get specifically for the law faculty (not the actual welcome pack as this is different and includes your student card and has information in Italian and English) is written only in Italian! Thankfully most of the important bits are just rooms and dates so they’re pretty easy to figure out!

Now back to the actual point of this post; once you have picked your modules and had them okayed by your home university, the problems (well not so much problems, I’d prefer to call them hiccoughs because that’s less negative!) so the hiccoughs, unfortunately don’t stop there.

More often than not, at least one of your classes will class with another.

Unfortunately there is nothing you can do about it, that’s just how it works. I am lucky because I only have one lecture clash and there are two pupils (another girl and I) from my home university so we split up and go to a different lecture each. This is obviously not possible if you’re on your own or have a lot more clashes but don’t worry, there are often two types of final exam available which take into account that you may have clashing classes. (This will not be the case for ALL classes I can only speak from my own experience). I will write more about exams and the different types in the second part of this post but for now the point is that the system at least acknowledges that may be teaching yourself i.e. studying from the book instead of attending lectures, for some of your classes. If this is the case for more than two classes I would recommend not taking any more classes that clash and explaining the problem to your home university who might agree with you some other solution where you take less credits or something along similar lines. Where you have to take clashing classes I would also at least email or make an appointment to see the teacher of those classes and explain your situation so that they are fully aware.

Having exhausted all the problems you may encounter with your timetable (and hopefully explaining the solutions to you so it doesn’t sound too negative!) I think that this is an appropriate place to split the posts (only because the post has a word limit!) so in the next half of this post which will be entitled: The Italian University System (2) (imaginative I know) I will talk more about registering for classes and exams, my own class experience (although not how classes are taught; this will have its own separate post later!) how the communication system between students and teachers work and the different types of exams.

Ciao for now! :)