Angry Italians don't mince words over Bologna

A battle is under way in Italy between academics who favour the Bologna-style three-plus-two degree system and those nostalgic for a golden age when a degree took a minimum four years.

Articles, letters to newspapers and postings on websites attest to the strength of feeling between the two camps, one of which in essence comprises scientists, who support the reforms, and the other humanities lecturers, who claim that three years is not enough to provide a serious basic education.

The debate exploded with the election of a new centre-Left Government, which is expected to launch yet another package of reforms of Italy's universities and research system. The protest is also undoubtedly an effort to influence policy.

In May, an article in La Repubblica by Pietro Citati, a classical scholar and occasional lecturer, described the Bologna reforms as "a national catastrophe". He said the three-year degree "destroys the chance of forming a modern elite... after three years a student knows almost nothing."

"The 70 per cent drop-out rate (when degrees lasted at least four years) was a good thing... (The dropouts) opened vegetable or cheese shops, or a geranium plantation with vague reminiscences of Homer, Saffo and Herodotus."

Carlo Bernardini, physics professor at La Sapienza University, responded with an attack on "the vulgar position of Citati... convinced that a ruling elite is made up only of erudite humanists".

Professor Bernardini attacked academics who defended the right to use the university as little as possible and "pass their time in places less infested by young people".

Stefano Manferlotti, professor of English language and literature at Naples University, commented: "It may be satisfactory that a three-year graduate in engineering knows how to make the electrical system for a block of flats. But what about a three-year graduate in Latin who has scarcely learnt the declensions of nouns? Or an Italian graduate who has read ten of Petrarch's sonnets and five cantos of the Divine Comedy? What will be the fate of these semi-illiterates?"

Fabio Mussi, the University Minister and a former communist, said radical reforms were on the way and that he wanted to create thousands of jobs in universities. But he is unlikely to have substantial resources to play with. Italy's budget deficit is almost 5 per cent of gross national product.