Abstract
The balance between teaching and research is rooted in the history of Italian contemporary university. Recent changes, though, put a pressure on it suggesting that this enduring balance might be called into question in the future. This chapter highlights both continuities and changes in the historical development of Italian university discussing their implications for teaching, research and their relationship. Two topics are especially addressed. First, the university reform of 1980 has shaped the Italian academic profession for the following 30 years. Second, recent policy initiatives have deeply changed the institutional environment within which Italian academics carry out their teaching and research activities. Some effects of these changes are visible in the results of the Changing Academic Profession survey while others are too recent to be detected by it. Relying on these results, Italian academics’ teaching and research activities and their views on the relationship between them are described, occasionally comparing Italian academics with their most similar colleagues in selected European countries.
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Notes
- 1.
On the basis of CAP data, Italian academics are compared to their most similar colleagues—that is, people working in universities—in four selected European countries, namely Finland, Germany, Norway and the United Kingdom.
- 2.
The Ministry was remerged with the Ministry of Education following the general reform of public administration in 1999 (Moscati 2006, p. 820).
- 3.
This fund—currently consisting of about €7 billion—is the main source of funding for universities.
- 4.
The restructuring of the Italian evaluation agencies has resulted in the establishment of the new Agenzia Nazionale per la Valutazione del Sistema Universitario e della Ricerca (National Agency for the Evaluation of Universities and Research Institutes; Law n. 286/2006, Presidential Decree n. 76/2010).
- 5.
The Ministry argued that it was necessary to take into account not only the above mentioned 5,500 study programmes but also their internal articulation in specific segments bringing the total number of offered courses to 8,250.
- 6.
Public research institutions include the Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (National Research Council; established in 1923), the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (National Institute of Nuclear Physics; established in 1951), the Agenzia Nazionale per le Nuove Tecnologie, l’Energia e lo Sviluppo Sostenibile (Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development; first established in 1960 as National Committee for Nuclear Energy) and the Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (Italian Space Agency; established in 1988).
- 7.
When the CAP survey was carried out, in Italy there were 88 universities: 61 public institutions including 3 polytechnics and 27 private institutions including 11 institutions providing distance learning. Most of the about 1.8 millions students (95 %) attended public universities.
- 8.
This item was included only in the Italian version of the CAP questionnaire.
- 9.
Teaching activities include the preparation of instructional materials and lesson plans, classroom instruction, advising students and reading and evaluating student work (it has to be noted that within Italian universities students can sit for exams several times during the academic year and not only at the end of the course); research activities include reading literature, writing, conducting experiments and carrying out fieldwork; service, administration and other activities include services to clients and/or patients, unpaid consulting, public or voluntary services, committees, department meetings, paperwork and other professional activities.
- 10.
According to the Ministry of Education and University (http://statistica.miur.it), the Italian university student body reached its maximum expansion in the year 2005/2006 (1,823,748) few years after the study programmes reform slightly decreasing in the next 5 years (−2.3 %). In the same period, the academic body, first grew from 2005 to 2008 (+4.2 %) reaching its maximum expansion (62,768) and then decreased by 8 % within 2010.
- 11.
The vocational programmes in the medical and health sector, which have been restructured but were already there before the reform, represent an exception.
- 12.
The abilitazione is a national certification which is needed to enter the professoriate or to move from the position of associated professor to the position of full professor.
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Rostan, M. (2014). Teaching and Research at Italian Universities: Continuities and Changes. In: Shin, J., Arimoto, A., Cummings, W., Teichler, U. (eds) Teaching and Research in Contemporary Higher Education. The Changing Academy – The Changing Academic Profession in International Comparative Perspective, vol 9. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6830-7_6
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