Scuola Superiore di Catania - Mediterranean University Centre
SCUOLA SUPERIORE DI CATANIA
President
Francesco Priolo
Administrative Director
Armando Conti
Via Valdisavoia 9
I-95123 Catania
Phone: (+39) 095 2338627
Fax: (+39) 095 360955
E-mail: scuolasuperiore@ssc.unict.it
PRESENTATION
Cultural area and aims
The Scuola Superiore di Catania is an university centre for outstanding students. Based on a famously successful model - the Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa - it was founded in 1998 to hand-pick only the best of the best and invest in their talents by providing them with all the support their imaginations need for exploration, research and experimentation.
The mission of the Scuola is to get these young scholars involved into research right away as well as to encourage international interest from all around the Mediterranean and further afield. On offer are innovative courses at the highest level: pre-undergraduate additional teaching, Masters, Advanced Post-graduate courses and Ph.D. courses in close conjunction with public and private sector research establishments .
Together with the Scuola Normale Superiore and the Scuola Sant’Anna di Pisa, the SISSA di Trieste, the ISUFI di Lecce and the IUSS di Pavia, the Scuola has joined the National Network of Scuole Superiori. The Scuola is in the centre of the Mediterranean, in one of the most venerable and learned regions, in which the first model of academia was born.
It is based in the prestigious Villa San Saverio. Built in 1880, it covers 13,000 mq of self-catering flats, library, gymnasium/ sports centre, reading rooms, lecture halls and laboratories equipped with the latest ICT, and all amid a large park setting a natural stage for the meeting of the talented.
All research and study takes place in the Etna Building, a magnet for transnational research which houses research laboratories, post-graduate lecture halls for innovative and strategic subjects as well as a hall of residence for foreign students and lecturers.
Students and course members all share the same environment, a meeting place for people - managers and students, researchers and professionals, entrepreneurs and youngsters with winning ideas - and cultures – university and business, technology and art, management and ICT, communication and law.
Research and Technological Application
Research excellence is Scuola’s main objective. From the beginning, undergraduate students join research groups having the chance to publish in journals and take part in national and international conferences.
The Scuola has its own experimental laboratories and has invested in industrial research thanks to contributions from many firms of the Etna Valley.
Spin-offs
“Etnalead: Integrated Platforms to Predict Molecular Bioactivity”
“MicroSensor s.r.l.” - Innovative Micro-optical Sensors
Laboratories
Laboratory for the Protection of Human Rights
Human rights, which have always been regarded as an extremely interesting issue, have a crucial relevance under a different point of view.
First of all, technical and scientific development has drawn attention to new issues, highlighting interests which could be called “rights”. The root of such issues, highlighting interests which could be called “rights”. The root of such issues has probably to be found in the law regulation of scientific and technological research, follows the special relevance acknowledged - as far as it concerns the right to health, and therefore the right to access to drugs - to biotechnological research, as well as to the related patent system, and, more in particular, to boosting research concerning rare diseases.
Secondly, facing the threat of global terrorism both the state and the constitutional principles reach a dimension which emphasizes the notion of security, claimed and appreciated as a right by itself, not only as a pre-condition for enjoying other rights.
In fighting international terrorism criminal policy strategies have to be shaped according to criteria which are deemed to be largely consistent with the principles of a state subject to the rule of law and with international law standards, rather than aiming at targets and methods that could turn out to be symptomatic of dangerous cultural retreats in the field of safeguards concerning the balance of state powers and the protection of fundamental rights.
Laboratory coordinator: Prof. Vincenzo Di Cataldo
Laboratory for Landscape and Green Area Planning
Sustainable development has to be meant as a strategy to promote social and economic development using territorial and environmental resources in a equitable way. The Laboratory aims to be closely linked to its surrounding territory so as to furnish the local community, as well as society in general, analytical and objective work methods to help understand the landscape and its complexities. It aims to offer instruments of knowledge that will lead to active management programmes, planning, design and integrated management for the sustainable development of the territory. In light of the above, the research project is articulated along this program: Sustainable landscape development in agro-urban Mediterranean coastline within desertification. Nowadays with climatic changes, global warming and desertification, attention and concrete responses, rational use of the planet’s resources and safeguarding the global ecosystem become essential presuppositions for sustainable development together with economic prosperity and balanced social quality. It is well known that these tensions are most exacerbated in strongly anthropic areas like the agro-urban Mediterranean coastline ones where extensive overbuilding due to urban, industrial and tourism sprawl, and intensive agriculture (reaching sometimes the sandy shores) have above all impoverished the coastline, depleted typical Mediterranean vegetation, eroded the soil, and therefore modified the environment.
Furthermore, even though a numerous variety of coastal zones have been urbanised, they should still be regarded as interactive, dynamic and fragile systems which need safeguarding.
Laboratory coordinator: Prof. Antonino Failla
Laboratory for Complex Systems
It is a multi-disciplinary laboratory focusing on researches on “Complex Systems”, and aiming at the training of the students of Scuola Superiore to work in this and in related fields. The laboratory is based on the strong interaction of students and researchers from diverse fields such as physics, mathematics, biology, medicine, chemistry, engineering and computer science, and consists in two experimental and two theoretical research lines/units:
- Structure and dynamics of complex networks: this research line deals with the analysis of the statistical and dynamical properties of complex systems, and with their representation as complex networks;
- Control of non linear circuits and complex dynamics: line based on the design, construction and control of non-linear circuits;
- Molecular biology and network genomics: this line deals with the development of advanced experimental methodology for the production and analysis of gene expression data;
- Advanced numerical methods for complex systems: this line provides a simulation environment for the other research lines, and carries out original research on innovative numerical methods.
Laboratory coordiantor: Prof. Vito Latora
Vocational Guidance
Every year the Scuola organises vocational guidance seminars for final year students based on the idea that vocational guidance is a structural component in education which helps them prepare for their future empowering them in study and at work.
These seminars are dedicated to those outstanding students who would like to be involved in a completely unique experience in contact with the university world and that of scientific and technological research. The aim of the seminars is not to present the Scuola, but to outline an ample panorama of experience and study themes in the university world, in research and in the work of institutions and professionals.
Placement and Careers
The Scuola maintains close links with industry to ensure that the students professional projects are in line with the labour market. The Scuola is assiduously committed to employability as a systematic component of career management: individual counselling, promotional events, conferences and workshops. Over 98% of Scuola graduates are employed within 6 months.
Placement activities materialise into informing, orienting and supporting students and graduates, lecturers and businesses, to bridge the gap between the expectations of the newly qualified and the diverse requirements of industry.
EDUCATIONAL OFFER
The Scuola provides its undergraduate students with advanced teaching in addition to their university courses, training as well as with research periods to guarantee students an extensive, diversified and qualified cultural experience.
Undergraduate education is organised into two classes: Literature and Social Sciences and Experimental Sciences. Please click here for the educational paths a.y. 2011-2012.
Apart from providing students with the competences and instruments needed, the Scuola guarantees them access to university laboratories and those of external agencies including those for national research like the National Institute for Nuclear Physics, the Astrophysical Observatory, the National Research Council (C.N.R.).
Students can benefit from various occasions promoted by the Scuola: fortnightly conferences, lectures and seminars. They offer an opportunity for enrichment as well as links with the highest professionals in work and in research. There is a highly selective entry exam to enable talented youngsters to enter the Scuola. Apart from the courses of the University Programme, each student of the Scuola follows a personalised study programme with at least 7 educational paths, plus seminars and laboratories, supervised by a tutor. From the beginning, students will be involved in the Scuola laboratories as well as in those working on national and international research projects.
Masters
The Master in Economia e Gestione del Settore Culturale aims at develop skills and expertise in various fields of the cultural sector, keeping the overall view of bounds (scarce economic and human resources), capability (social and economic benefit) and existing connections among heritage and cultural activities.
Master Coordinator: Prof. Romilda Rizzo - University of Catania.
Post-graduate
The Scuola offers a varied programme of high specialization and Masters. All the courses are on cutting-edge themes which are highly stimulating, Europe centred and open to different cultures. The courses provide concrete feedback to students, promoting managerial and entrepreneurial competence, as well as managerial innovation through personal development.
The Scuola prides itself in its innovative didactics which aims at professional growth and personal and individual development. The study routes guarantee qualified content and rigorous methodology always linked with innovation, creativity and imagination. Above all, it is offered to students the opportunity to immerse themselves in life-changing experiences both individually and professionally.
International Educational Opportunities
The Centres of Excellence are crossroads of knowledge which originates from all over the world. The Scuola is one of the most prestigious cultural intersection in the Mediterranean Area. The intent on excellence is indissolubly projected towards the international scientific community.
Our network of foreign universities also includes the University of California at Berkeley, Cairo University, Nagoya University, Nara Institute of Science and Technology (National University Corporation), the Munich Intellectual Property Law Centre, Heidelberg University, the University of Buffalo, The State University of New York - Department of Anthropology and many others.
International Masters
The Master in Mininvasive Surgery and New Technologies aims at developing skills in mininvasive surgery and computer technologies in order to promote the development of specific competences and skills in relation to us of equipment and technical support, offer surgeons the opportunity to master applications and to acquire manual ability as well as operating experience while providing with practical expertise.
An Organising Committee oversees the overall academic organisation of the course.
Master Coordinator: Prof. Domenico Russello - University of Catania.
International Ph.D. Courses
In the past few years, the Scuola has activated International Ph.D. Courses in collaboration with prestigious foreign Universities, shouldering joint responsibility in the planning and management of educational and training program, student mobility as well as titles. The courses are held in English and the research activities are carried out in an international environment.
International Ph.D. in Energy
The International Ph.D. course is developed on two different curricula: Energy Production and Generation and Sustainable Use of Energy.
Ph.D. Coordinator: Prof. Alfio Consoli
International Ph.D. in Translational Biomedicine
Subjects of the PhD program are Stem cells, Molecular diagnostic and Molecular epidemiology.
Ph.D. Coordinator: Prof. Daniele Condorelli
International Ph.D. in Nanosciences
Subjects of the Ph.D. program are Mesoscopic Electronics, Nano-Photonics, Molecular Biophysics, Advanced Functional Materials and Nanobiosciences.
Ph.D. Coordinator: Prof. Mariagrazia Grimaldi
International Ph.D. in Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics
The objective of the mentioned Ph.D. is to transfer to the new generation of physicist the experiences and the know how of the partners. The mentioned objective includes close collaboration of the existing network or those foreseen at a European and extra-European level.
Ph.D. Coordinator: Prof. Umberto Lombardo
International Ph.D. in Global Politics and European Integration
This PhD is organised in order to give graduates with a strong background in the social sciences the opportunity to enrich their scientific knowledge by carrying out their original research project on a momentous issue of global politics and European integration, in association with the scientific experience and resources of an international network of scholars and academic institutions.
Ph.D. Coordinator: Prof. Fulvio Attinà
Contacts
Scientific Committee
Prof. Marcello Fontanesi, Rector of the University of Milano-Bicocca
Prof. Benedetto Matarazzo, University of Catania
Prof. Vincenzo Milanesi, University of Padova
Prof. Ferdinando Nicoletti, University of Catania
President
Francesco Priolo
Administrative Director
Armando Conti
Address
Via Valdisavoia 9
I-95123 Catania -Italy
Tel.: (+39) 095 2338627
Fax: (+39) 095 360955
E-mail: scuolasuperiore@ssc.unict.it
Website