The Italian system for vocational training runs along two lines:

1. activities under the direct responsibility of the state (the vocational education system);
2. activities under the responsibility of the regions (the vocational training system).

• vocational training aimed at those who have finished compulsory schooling (2 or 3 year courses)
• vocational training aimed at those who have an upper secondary school diploma or a degree (1 or 2 years)
• adult training (the unemployed, people on refresher or retraining courses)
• apprenticeships or training work contracts.

Government distance training provision

Proprietary distance training provision

Scuola Radio Elettra

Scuola Italo-Svizzera di Luino

Distance teaching university

University level distance education

Government Distance Training Provision

Proprietary distance education provision

The private sector is represented today by Dr. Morizo Polidori of Turin whose institution has purchased the remaining private distance education colleges in Italy including Scuola Radio Elletra of Turin and Istituto Svizzero Luino, on the borders with Switzerland, and the former Scuola Academia di Roma. The Scuola Radio Elletra was founded in 1951 and today has 80 courses for a duration of 6 to 9 months each and with a total enrolment of 1,027.

Finally Trainet, run by Dr. Delaporta, is a group which includes Italian Telecom. Trainet was founded in 1992 and today has 184 courses of a duration of one month to 2 years with an enrolment of 63,000, and dealing with business training and telecommunications training. Trainet is owned by the Italian Telecom Group, which was privatised recently, and which started by offering distance education courses internally for the training of Italian Telecom staff and 2 years ago broadened its market to include students from other business groupings as well.

• Methods of Educational Evaluation with 555 enrolled,
• General and Museum didactics 552 enrolled,
• Didactical Orientation for Teachers 536 enrolled,
• Education Technology 523 enrolled,
• there is also a distance education course in Esperanto with 150 students enrolled.

• This gives a total of 2,316 students in 1997.
• The programme is directed by Professor Benedetto Vertecchi. The centre has published a series of academic studies of distance education (Vertecchi 1988) and publishes an international journal, Istruzione a distanza (Distance Education).

The Politechnico di Milano and the Politechnico di Torino are offering technology based tutoring via the Internet for students enrolled at the university.

University level Consortia

The CTU Moebius Consortium is located at Milan and directed by Dott.essa Daniella Scaccia and it had 12 enrolments in 1997. The Moebius Consortium is run from the State University in Milan and has a post-graduate course in Urban Sociology for students of the Department of Political Sciences.

The Forecome Consortium is a government university-level consortium established in 1990 which offers 40 courses of post-graduate diploma level associated with the University of Roma I, for a total enrolment of 3,000. The Forecome Consortium is directed by Dotessa. Levi.

Consorzio Nettuno was founded in 1992 and has six courses in 1997 each of a duration of 36 months for a total enrolment of 2,200. All of these would be primarily enrolled in their own universities.

The six programmes are:

• Post-graduate diploma in Computer Engineering
• Post-graduate diploma in Telecommunications Engineering
• Post-graduate diploma in Electronic Engineering,
• Post-graduate diploma in Electrical Engineering
• Post-graduate diploma in Mechanical Engineering
• Post-graduate diploma in the Logistics of Business Production.

The Consorzio per l'Univserità a Distanza (CUD) at Rende, Calabria, was founded in 1984. In November 1996 it was placed in what is known in Italian law as 'una procedura di amministrazione controllata devanti al Tribunali di Cosenza', as it had very large debts. This procedure will last from November 1996 to November 1998 for a period of two years to enable the Consortium to attempt to establish with its banks a financial package.

Its present courses are based on the Post-graduate Diploma in Economics with 125 students enrolled in 1997. The Laurea a distanza, for which the first developments were commenced in 1985, is no longer being offered nor is the Post-graduate Diploma in Computing Science which was started in 1984. The CUD also offers short 2 month courses in professional formation with enrolments of 40 students in each course. The future survival of the CUD depends on the present administration under leadership of the new director general Professor Aiello solving its financial difficulties and focusing the development of the CUD in the future in preuniversity courses at a distance for students about to enter university and in courses at a distance in computing for those without computing skills.

In the 1980s the government of Italy favoured a consortium model for the development of distance education in Italy and two consorzia were founded: the Consorzio per l'Università a Distanza (CUD) and the Consorzio Nettuno. The Consorzio per l'Università a Distanza (CUD) with headquarters at Rende, a suburb of Cosenza in Calabria, had socii (members) which were Italian universities and a range of major Italian companies.

The complexity of Italian university legislation posed problems for the planning for an Italian open university system in 1983. The possibility of founding an open university was unrealistic as it would have been difficult to get the legislation through parliament, with the distinct possibility that such an unusual departure from university procedure would never have passed. The possibility of founding a distance education department of a conventional university was blocked by legislation and the impossibility legally to pay the staff for their distance education work.

A solution was found in sections 60 and 61 of the Higher Education law 1592 of 31 August 1933 in accordance with which a consortium was founded to activate structures for the production of materials and the tutoring of students who enrolled in the universities which joined the consortium and which examined the students for their degrees. This consortium is called the Consorzio per l'Università a Distanza and was founded in March 1984. It received its juridical approval from the President of Italy (DPR) on 19 November 1986 and until recently it was teaching a university diploma in computing science and a range of other courses.

The Consorzio Nettuno which is based in Rome and is a structure comprising the national broadcaster, the RAI, and a number of universities including the Politecnico di Torino, the Politecnico di Milano, the University of Naples and a range of major Italian corporate structures including IRI, Italian Telecom, and the Cofindustria for delivering university courses by satellite.

Its courses are broadcast in the early morning by RAI 1 and RAI 2 for students in employment who usually record the programmes for later viewing, study learning materials, and have the availability of optional evening lectures. The major participant is the Politecnico di Torino which has an enrolment of 920 in 1996 at three satellite receive sites.

In spite of these achievements there are indications that some conventional Italian universities would prefer to take distance education into their own hands rather than work through consortia.

• 4 universities
• 4 university consortia
• two private or semi-private entities.

1994

1995

1996

1997