Polytechnic University of Milan
The Polytechnic University of Milan is the largest public technical university in the country, with about 40,000 enrolled students. The university offers undergraduate, graduate, and higher education courses in engineering, architecture and design.
Established in 1863 by Francesco Brioschi, the Politecnico di Milano is the oldest university in Milan; inspired by German and Swiss polytechnics, Brioschi founded the school in the hope of bettering Italy's scientific and technological progress. By the 20th century, the school had gained international recognition thanks to its influential faculty and a strong emphasis on largely modernist principles.
The university is made up of two central campuses in Milan, the Bovisa and Leonardo, where the majority of the research and teaching activities are located, as well as other satellite campuses in five other cities across Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna. The university’s central offices and headquarters are located in Città Studi’s Leonardo Campus, active since 1927.
Since its foundation, the Politecnico di Milano provides a diverse selection of graduate programs. Of its 40,000 students, about 8,000 are international from more than 100 countries. The university also has established partnerships with several other institutions around the world, including ETH Zurich, TU Delft, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. As of 2024, the Politecnico di Milano had an acceptance rate of 28%.
The Politecnico di Milano is considered one of the leading technical universities in Italy and in Europe, and is consistently ranked as one of the best schools for architecture, design and engineering in the world. According to the QS World University Rankings for the subject area 'Engineering & Technology', it ranked in 2022 as the 23rd best in the world; It also ranked 7th worldwide for design, 12th for civil and structural engineering, 9th for mechanical and aerospace engineering and 7th for architecture. In 2024, SCImago Institutions Rankings listed the school 6th for architecture and amongst the top fifty schools for engineering in the world.
Some of the most notable alumni and professors from the school include Nobel laureate Giulio Natta, engineer, inventor, and aeronautical pioneer Enrico Forlanini, astrophysicist Amalia Ercoli Finzi, novelist Carlo Emilio Gadda, musician Demetrio Stratos, and architects Renzo Piano and Aldo Rossi.
History
The Politecnico di Milano was founded on 29 November 1863 by Francesco Brioschi, secretary of the Ministry of Education and rector of the University of Pavia. Its establishment was part of a broader movement in Italy to advance technical and scientific education, which in result would support industrial and technological development during the country's early years of unification.Its original name was Istituto Tecnico Superiore and only Civil and Industrial Engineering were taught. Architecture, the second main line of study at the university, was introduced in 1865 in cooperation with the Brera Academy. There were only 30 students admitted in the first year. Over the decades, most of the students were men: the first female graduate from the university was in 1913.
File:Azzone, Giannini and Mattarella - PoliMi 2015.jpg|thumb|left|Former rector Giovanni Azzone with the Education Minister Stefania Giannini and Italian President Sergio Mattarella at the Bovisa campus in 2015In 1927 the university moved to piazza Leonardo da Vinci, in the district now known as Città studi, where the university's main facilities are still today. At the time, it was named Regio Politecnico. The word Regio was removed as Italy was proclaimed a republic at the end of World War II. The historical building still in use today was designed and built by engineers and architects all graduated from the university itself.
The present logo, based on a detail of the preparatory sketch of Raphael's School of Athens, was adopted in 1942. Until then, there was no official logo for the institution.
In 1954, the first European centre of electronic computation was opened at the university by Gino Cassinis and Ercole Bottani. In 1963 Giulio Natta received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his research on crystalline polymers, polypropylene in particular. In 1977, the satellite Sirio, jointly developed by the university and other companies, was launched. In 1979, POLIMI Graduate School of Management, the Polytechnic's business school has been created.
Since the end of the 1980s, the university has begun a process of territorial expansion that would have resulted in the opening of its satellite campuses in Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna. A university program in industrial design was started in 1993. In 2000, the university's faculty of design was created with new courses in undergraduate and postgraduate programs of graphic & visual, fashion and interior design along with the already existent industrial design.
In April 2012, the university announced that, beginning in 2014, all graduate courses would be taught only in English. This decision was then partially revised, after the decision of the Italian Supreme Court, that stated the Italian language could not be totally abolished nor downgraded to a marginal role. On the 7th of September 2019, XJTU-POLIMI Joint School has been opened in Xi'an, China, which is a joint school of Polytechnic University of Milan and Xi'an Jiaotong University.
Campuses
The University is spread over seven campuses: two main campuses in Milan and another three satellite campuses across Lombardy and one Emilia-Romagna.Milan Leonardo
Milan Leonardo is the oldest of the university's campuses still in use. The first buildings on Piazza Leonardo da Vinci were inaugurated in 1927. Over the years, the complex has been expanded and is now generally referred to as "Città Studi", City of Studies, which also refers to some faculties of the University of Milan in the same area. The campus extends over several streets: Leonardo, Bonardi, Clericetti, Mancinelli, Gran Sasso and Colombo.The Leonardo Campus is the main campus of the university and comprises the central administration offices, the rectorate, and most of the research departments.
Milan Bovisa
The Milan Bovisa campus is located in the Bovisa district of Milan and became active in 1989; campus Bovisa is today composed of campus Durando, opened in 1994, and campus La Masa, inaugurated in 1997. The first is the seat of the School of Design, while the second is dedicated to Industrial, Mechanical, Aerospace, and Energy Engineering faculties. Bovisa also houses the related research facilities, including the wind tunnel.Other campuses
The first satellite campuses opened in 1987 in Como and in 1989 in Lecco. During the 1990s, three other branches opened in Cremona, Mantua, and Piacenza. These last three branches are currently open. On the 7th of September 2019, XJTU-POLIMI Joint School has been opened in Xi'an, China, which is a joint school of Polytechnic University of Milan and Xi'an Jiaotong University.Academics
The Politecnico di Milano offers several three-year undergraduate courses, two-year graduate courses, one-year master courses and PhD programs in the fields of engineering, architecture and design. The university offers 32 first level degree programs.File:Renzo Piano e Giorgio Napolitano.jpg|thumb|Renzo Piano with the President of Italy Giorgio Napolitano in 2007
The academic year is divided into two terms, or semesters, the first from mid-September to late January and the second from March to late June. There are 3 exam sessions: those at the end of each semester and one more in September. Students need to achieve 60 "university credits" per year during their Bachelor's and master's degrees. Therefore, the 3-years Bachelor requires 180 credits while the 2-years Master 120. The university, like most universities in Italy, is organized to comply with the framework of the Bologna Process.
The university maintains several relations with foreign universities and offers a wide range of international projects for student exchange, The university encourages the enrollment of foreign students by providing several courses in English, German and Spanish. It participates in the ENTREE network for student exchange among Electrical Engineering colleges in Europe and it is a member of Top Industrial Managers for Europe network.
The Alta Scuola Politecnica is a joint institution of the Politecnico di Milano and Polytechnic University of Turin addressed to young talents who want to develop their interdisciplinary capabilities for leading and promoting innovation, and runs in parallel to the two-year programs of laurea magistrale.
International opportunities
The university offers several opportunities for students that want to integrate their studies with an experience outside Italy.Some of them are:
- ATHENS Programme
- ERASMUS Programme
- Erasmus Mundus Programme
- Master of European Design
- Partnership of a European Group of Aeronautics and Space Universities
- UNITECH International
- Global Engineering Education Exchange