University adds Italian universities to exchange list

Students and faculty at The University of Montana looking to broaden their horizons with international travel just got two new opportunities at universities in Northern Italy.

UM has signed exchange agreements with the University of Brescia and the Catholic University of Northern Italy to promote student and faculty exchanges. Opportunities for work internships and research exchanges also will be available. The agreements, signed last month, were facilitated in part by the World Trade Centers at UM and the University of Brescia.

“We did these agreements in two days, which is amazing,” said UM Executive Vice President Jim Foley. “There were lots of people helping on both sides.”

Exchanges will begin after UM’s International Committee has identified the best areas for partnership and UM President George Dennison gives the okay, most likely sometime in the next year.

Director of the Office of International Programs Mehrdad Kia said that UM currently has 64 such agreements in place with schools around the world and that in the last four years the number in Europe has seen the sharpest spike.

“The Italian universities are very prestigious,” he said, noting that they are among the highest ranked in all of Italy in the sciences.
UM is the only school in the United States that has such an agreement with the University of Brescia.

“These two agreements open new areas of opportunity for faculty, staff and students,” said Dennison. “In the rapidly globalizing world, we must always remain open to such opportunities,” he said. “And the involvement of the World Trade Center opens new directions we have not explored in the past.”

“This is good for UM, good for students, good for faculty, good for the state of Montana,” Foley said.