Androulla Vassiliou’s assertion that education reforms under the Bologna Process have been “largely successful” (“Vassiliou takes a modest line”, EuropeanVoice.com, 15 January) would be a bit more palatable if these reforms had filtered down to Italy.

We recently furnished the European Commission with a sample of 255 foreign lecturers, or lettori, teaching in 18 Italian universities showing that 83% of the lettori were still not receiving their rights to equal treatment as interpreted by several judgments made by the European Court of Justice over the course of two decades.

Twenty-seven of the sample teach at the University of Bologna, where in 1999 education ministers from across Europe signed the ‘Bologna Process’ intended to integrate Europe’s systems of higher education. But in the University of Bologna, the only process these lettori have experienced is that of mass sackings, countless court cases and constant institutional patterns of behaviour working against the goals of integration.

We trust that when ministers and commissioners attend the Bologna Ministerial Anniversary Conference in mid-March, they will have something to say about this ‘other Bologna process’ in which two of the 27 lettori have died without being compensated and five are fighting for proper pensions after years of service.

From:

David Petrie

Chairman

Associazione Lettori di Lingua Straniera in Italia

Verona