Worldwide, Florence is known for its important and very rich cultural, architectural and artistic heritage; Florence was the cradle of “Renaissance humanism” which then spread throughtout Europe.
The city is visited every year by millions of tourists from every country in the world. Furthermore, many European and American Universities have their own premises or programmes in Florence.
Therefore, the University of Florence has a natural international vocation, and the development of internationalization is one of its strategic priorities.
Internationalization is a key word in the evolution of the Italian university system, but even more, it is now a necessary dimension of the university activity. The internationalization process has developed through a progressive integration of the international and multicultural dimension in the Institution’s major functions: teaching, research and services.
International activities of the University of Florence can be grouped under the following main headings:
International agreements of cultural and scientific cooperation have been signed with about 260 Universities in foreign countries.
These agreements aim to encourage direct cooperation between institutions of higher learning in different countries and to promote the reciprocal exchange of teachers, researchers, students and technical and administrative staff.
The agreements are usually set up on the initiative of the Faculties or Departments that, through this instrument, formalize pre-existing contacts in specific fields of interest, many of which involve several administrative units.
The agreements establish, on strictly-observed criteria of equality and mutual interests, the fields of study and research, the types of collaboration, the insurance and funding procedures.
Each University appoints a coordinator who promotes the implementation of the activities foreseen by the agreement.
The agreements are usually stipulated according to a draft agreement (pdf) approved by the Academic bodies of the University of Florence.
Research activities carried out in the departments of the University move within an international dimension; Florence is active in many projects funded by the European Union within the Framework Programmes for Research and Technological Development (FP).
Based on the Treaty establishing the European Union, the Framework Programmes serve two main strategic objectives: strengthening the scientific and technological bases of industry, thus encouraging its international competitiveness, and promoting research activities to support other EU policies.
Moreover the University of Florence participates in further funding opportunities offered within the different General Directions of the European Commission.
There is a rich experience in teaching staff and student exchanges; indeed in Italy, Florence enjoys the highest number of student mobility exchanges within the Socrates Erasmus Programme.
The University of Florence is involved in 420 programmes of inter-university cooperation with EU, East European and North European countries.
The University of Florence is very active in the development and realization of study programmes which lead to jointly-recognized academic titles, i.e. primary or specialization degrees which are recognized both in Italy and in other European and non European countries.
Two double-recognized degrees have been established: an Italian-French Law Degree (Laurea Magistrale in Giurisprudenza, Maîtrise and Master 2 en Droit) in partnership with the Université de Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, since the academic year 2000-2001, and an Italian-Spanish Law Degree (Laurea Magistrale in Giurisprudenza and Grado en Derecho), in association with the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, since the academic year 2002-2003.
A limited number of students, from Italy and other Countries, is admitted to the programs. During the five years of the degree students attend courses both at the Universities of Florence and Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne or Autónoma de Madrid.
The international PhD courses follow these same lines, and programmes have emerged with the Universities of Utrecht, Frankfurt, Colorado, Arizona, Madrid (Complutense), Braunschweig, Bonn, Salamanca, Paris IV Sorbonne, and Sevilla.
Special projects, which lead to jointly recognized degrees, particularly PhD Courses, have been recognized and financed by the Italian Ministry of University and Education.
A new international training path has been activated since 2008, in cooperation with the Universities of Bonn (Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität) and Budapest (Eotvos Lorand University). The bilateral training is characterized by joint degree programs, which are provided within BA (L11 class) and MA (LM37 class) degree courses. The latter are particularly concerned with and aimed at the linguistic and literary, philological and intercultural European studies (limited number Curricula in Bilateral Studies / Italo-German Studies; Italo-Hungarian Studies).
By reason of its international vocation, every year the University of Florence hosts a large number of prestigious delegations from foreign Universities.
These visits usually lead to the development of cultural and scientific cooperation through formal agreements stipulated according to the draft approved by the Academic bodies of the University of Florence.
These agreements aim to promote the reciprocal exchange of teachers, researchers, students and technical and administrative staff.