Promoter of transnational relations

Unipi Team Leader: Francesco Marcelloni, Vice-Rector for International Cooperation and Relations

The Mobility Consortium PRT-"Promoter of transnational relations" was born from the long lasting cooperation among six large and medium Italian Universities: the Universities of Pisa, Padua, Trieste, Catania and Venice: Ca' Foscari and Iuav.
The objective of the project was to organize traineeship mobility so that participants, from different degree courses, could acquire soft and hard skills and could be able, after the mobility experience, to work in international contexts, also developing transnational relations between the business world and its stakeholders.
The project intended to respond to the needs in term of skills, expressed by local companies and employers. Through the research work carried out in particular by the labour market Observatory of the University of Padua, we are able to understand better these needs and one of the key demands by companies is to have graduates able to work in international contexts, able to work using foreign languages and to network also at a transnational level.
The project addressed students of all the disciplines with a greater attention to students in social, political sciences and humanities, who usually encounter more difficulties in entering the world of work and need to have in their curriculum qualified international traineeship experiences, to increase their employability.
The available funds were initially distributed among the 6 participating Universities according to the requests of each University and the number of mobilities performed during the year 2014/15. Each University contributes with functions and key activities in the project through the office that is responsible for the implementation of the Erasmus for traineeship program.
Each University with the coordination and supervision of the University of Padua, has organized and managed its own selection, managed relations with its partners, monitored traineeships and ensured full recognition of mobilities.
During the academic year 2015/16 the Consortium organised 245 traineeship mobilities, 149 were funded with Erasmus funds and the other with national funds. In the previous year 177 mobilities were carried out. This increase is due to the widespread publicity and dissemination made by the Universities towards its students, teachers and potential European partners. The traineeships have had an average duration of three months and 15 days. More than 470 months have been financed by Erasmus funds and 862 months of traineeship have been carried out by the beneficiaries. Hosting partners were 241 in 26 different countries.
The internships took place mainly in hosting partners such as: language schools, law firms, consultancy firms, local bodies, corporations, banks, chambers of Commerce, international foundations, museums, libraries, NGOs, research institutes and universities. The majority of the participants considered that the training activities were relevant and in line with its educational programme and was satisfied with the mobility experience. They found also that the language proficiency in a foreign language have improved during their mobility.
As for the qualitative objectives of internships, participants generally have acquired the skills and competencies that had been foreseen in the learning agreements. The skills were those required by companies working in a globalised context: skills related to the use of foreign languages in the workplace, hard skills related to the study course, but above all soft skills such as communication, networking, problem-solving skills. By analyzing the participant reports and hosting institutions evaluations, we can see that participants could benefit from an overall strengthening of employability and of their career prospects because of the improvement or acquisition of hard, soft and language skills, and through increased proactivity, sense of initiative and intercultural awareness.

Coordinator:  UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI PADOVA (Italy) 

Other participants: 

UNIVERSITA CA' FOSCARI VENEZIA (Italy)
UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI CATANIA (Italy)
UNIVERSITA IUAV DI VENEZIA (Italy)
UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI TRIESTE (Italy)
UNIVERSITA DI PISA (Italy)

Start date: 01-06-2015

End date: 31-05-2017

EU Grant: 265,213.49 €