From TV to the Internet, from the Consorzio NETTUNO of 1992 to the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO. The First Italian Distance University that changed the Way to spread Knowledge in Italy and across the World

• Today, at 5 pm,UNINETTUNO presents the Digital Talk on the story and origins of the first Online Italian University, streamed live on the University’s website and FB page
• The event will be introduced by the Rector, Prof. Maria Amata Garito, and will see the participation of some of its founders: Prof. Patrizio Bianchi, Prof. Luciano De Menna, Prof. Francesco Profumo and Prof. Giovanni Puglisi

Rome, the 11th June 2020 – A University that, since 1992, keeps on democratizing the access to knowledge all over the world thanks to the new technologies. The first Distance University that has become an excellence-level global pole that, in almost thirty years of activities, trained over 8 thousand professors of the traditional Universities – who delivered their distance teaching courses on the television and on the Internet – and that created the largest European digital repository of videolessons and multimedia academic contents, with over 50 thousand of videolessons realized by the best lecturers of the Italian Universities and of Universities of various countries of the world and over 10 million pages (lecture notes, books, exercises, articles linked to the issues treated in the videolessons). An Italian success story in the world that, for the first time, in 1992, utilizes satellite telecommunications networks to bring academic learning to everybody’s homes. 

Today, the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO tells about itself in a Digital Talk entitled: “From TV to the Internet, from the Consorzio NETTUNO of 1992 to the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO” that will be held online, streamed live on the University’s website and FB page. This event is aimed at highlighting the founding values of UNINETTUNO’s teaching and learning methodology – passion, research, innovation, internationalization and inclusion together with the origins of the University.

“UNINETTUNO’s success is its history and its past, linked to the places where, since ever, thanks to research work, new knowledge have been developed and transferred through teaching: the Universities. Thanks to the history of its origins, UNINETTUNO has always been developing many international research projects to identify new methodologies useful to develop and share knowledge by means of the new technologies”, the Rector of the University, Prof. Maria Amata Garito, stated. “That of UNINETTUNO is a visionary and pioneering history that was ahead of times, if we consider the central role that e-Learning is playing in these years and, in particular, in these latest months. All schools and universities across the world, due to the health emergency, today are using e-Learning to carry on their teaching activities on the Internet; however, very often, this new teaching mode is carried on with much improvisation and, therefore, with poor results.”

UNINETTUNO psycho-pedagogic model does not utilizes the platforms created by third parties, but it is the outcome of 25 years of research work, conducted by the Rector Garito and by her team including experts in various disciplines: technologies, computer scientists, psychologists, pedagogues and experts in different languages.

The results of this research work and their application allowed for the creation of Internet-based learning environments where, at the center of the educational process, there is the student who can study with the highest degree of flexibility, where he wishes to, when he wishes to and how he wished to thanks to digitalized videolessons and multimedia educational materials connected to them. The student is never left alone during his learning processes and he is always supported through the Internet by professors-tutors for each discipline. By means of interactive classrooms, forums and tridimensional virtual classrooms on UNINETTUNO’s Island of Knowledge on Second Life, the students develop collaborative learning and become, themselves, active constructors of new knowledge.

This Digital Talk will see the participation of some founders and protagonists of the story of the Consorzio and of the UNINETTUNO University: Prof. Maria Amata Garito, Prof. Patrizio Bianchi, Prof. Luciano De Menna, Prof. Francesco Profumo and Prof Giovanni Puglisi.

The origins of UNINETTUNO: the birth of Consorzio Nettuno in 1992 and the growth of the University thanks to psycho-pedagogic model that is unique across the World

1992 saw the birth of NETTUNO - Network per l''Università Ovunque, a consortium that, in a few years, saw the participation of 43 Italian Universities and 31 foreign Universities, the first consortium at international level aimed at realizing Distance Teaching University Courses. It was the year of the first programs of Rai NETTUNO SAT, the first European digital satellite channel devoted to university education on television. With Consorzio NETTUNO, for the first time, Universities and companies cooperate to bring university learning and knowledge in everybody’s homes by means of satellite telecommunication networks and by means of the new technologies. A no-profit consortium, promoted by the then Minister of the University and Scientific and Technological Research, Prof. Antonio Ruberti, established on the 12th November 1991; its founding members were 27 renowned Italian public Universities and companies such as:  Confindustria, IRI,  RAI, Telespazio and Telecom Italia, former SIP. In 2005, Consorzio NETTUNO gave birth to the International Telematic University UNINETTUNO that, thanks to its Internet-based distance teaching psycho-pedagogic model was prized and recognized by the international scientific community.

UNINETTUNO today: 28 thousand students, 114 technological poles all over the World and 200 exam centers.
Today, 28 thousand students attending 30 degree courses, offered by UNINETTUNO, master’s courses and MOOCs, coming from 176 countries of the world, study on UNINETTUNO’s portal, which is available in five languages and on the satellite television channel, Uninettunouniversity.Tv (watchable for free on channel 812 of Sky and 701 of the Tivùsat platform of RAI), over 700 professors and researcher produce and post their constantly-updated educational contents in the learning environments and in the Didactic Cyberspace of the University.
Thanks to a networked structure, based on 114 technological poles, spread all over the world and 200 exam centers, established at the Italian Embassies, Italian Cultural Institutes and Universities of various countries, the student can take their exams in many countries, earning a study title recognized all over Europe. Besides, they can benefit from the Erasmus+ international mobility program that allows them to pass stages and internships periods in European and extra-European countries, as, for example, Egypt, Lebanon and Morocco.