The Università della Svizzera italiana (USI) has concluded its first decade. A chance of taking stock of it

By Dr Marco Baggiolini, former President of the USI

The idea of a University in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland came more than 150 years ago, but several attempts to realize it failed. The long gestation had a major advantage : when USI, known in English as the University of Lugano, was founded, in 1996, the Swiss University System had changed, and new governance and management rules could be applied to accelerate decision making and enhance performance.

Rapid growth to excellence

Although it was generally recognized that multilingual Switzerland should afford a university of Italian language, the project encountered considerable opposition. We believed in the idea, and resistance was additional motivation, it simply meant that we couldn’t fail ! USI grew rapidly and acquired all the components of a full university, i.e., Bachelor, Master and Ph.D. programs in all Faculties as well as several Masters of Advanced Studies. Two achievements were particularly significant : the rapid development of experimental research in several disciplines, and the increasing involvement in national and international projects and programs. For the whole University, competitive financial support from reputed institutions for the advancement of science increased six-fold between 2000 and 2006.

Through research, a university defines its profiles, supports its specialty teaching at the level of Master and Ph.D. studies, and develops contacts and collaborations with other Institutions. In a new University, research is essential for establishing reputation and attractiveness for Faculty members, postdoctoral fellows and Ph.D. students. Our effort in this direction has put Lugano on the international academic map. The Faculties of Economics and of Informatics became members of the National Centers of Competence in “Finance” and “Mobile communications systems” and other institutes entered collaborative teaching and research programs, e.g., Swiss School of Public Health, Public Management and Policies, Swiss Virtual Campus, Réseau Cinéma Suisse, and many others, with Swiss and Italian institutions.

Architecture, a different Faculty

In the past, studying architecture in Switzerland meant choosing between Zurich and Lausanne. Since ten years, there is an alternative : USI’s Academy of Architecture enriches the offer of the two national Technology schools with its different approach. Several disciplines in the area of humanities integrate a plan of studies centering on the constructed space : its creation, management and renewal, and its relations to society and environment.

The centuries-old tradition of architects and builders in the lake regions of Ticino and Northern Italy, and the recent, modern and post-modern revival are the ground on which the Academy was thought and realized. At the Academy, the students work and learn within project studios, everyone at his/her own drawing table, which underscores the central role of the project in architectural education at USI. The studios are headed by architects, known in Switzerland and abroad for their work, who are at the same time teachers and successful representatives of the profession. By regularly changing studio the students are exposed to major trends of international architecture. Presently our 20 studios represent styles and approaches of several European Countries, i.e., France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Holland, Portugal, Spain and the UK, in addition to the four cultural areas of Switzerland.

	Marco Baggiolini Honorary Professor, University of Bern, Switzerland Former President of the USI Born in 1936 in Bellinzona (TI), Switzerland
	High school, Medicine and Biochemistry, University of Basel, Switzerland
	1983–1987 Assistant lecturer, Biochemistry, University of Bern, Switzerland
	1967– 1970 Associate researcher, Rockefeller University, NY, USA Studies on leukocytes as research associate of Christian de Duve (Nobel laureate in 1974)
	1979–1983 Head of Immunology and Inflammation research at Sandoz Ltd., Basel, Switzerland
	1983–2001 Chairman of the Theodor Kocher Institute, University of Bern, Switzerland Full Professor of Cellular Biology Head of a research group that discovered chemokines Member of the Swiss National Science Foundation, installed the National Centers of Competence in Research
	1992– Among the 100 most quoted immunologists worldwide and the ten most quoted scientists in Switzerland, received numerous national and international awards
	1996–08.2006 First President of the University of Lugano, Switzerland