"This project aims to provide students with the opportunity to deepen their knowledge on the relationship between public opinion, the media and European integration. The course will be structured in two modules. In the first module, students will analyze the historical evolution of attitudes of public opinion on European policy issues and the reasons for this development. The second module will focus on analyzing the contents of the ""European discourse"" and the image of the EEC / EU presented by the national media (newspapers, television, websites) and the Community (through its information policy). Particular attention will be paid to the analysis of ""misrepresentation"" (i.e: the identification between the Euro and the EU; the EU as a threat to the well-being of Europeans; the EU as an entity only bureaucratic) that spread a distorted image of the EU, its institutions and its policies. Teaching activities will be based on the lectures, the seminars and the organization of round tables. The seminars provide for the participation (among others) of journalists who will explain to students what are the empirical and normative rules they use in the selection of European issues they bring to the public's attention. The seminars will also include the participation of officials from EU institutions that will explain the methods and objectives of the EU information policy. Also scholars and experts in European Studies will participate in the seminars envisaged by the project. Roundtables include the participation of MEPs and national MPs dealing with European issues. They will explain to students how the activity of EU institutions can be influenced by the attitude of public opinion. They will also explain what they ""expect"" from the citizens in terms of their participation and in terms of citizen involvement in European issues."

The project was run by the University of Siena, which can count on a very long experience with mobility issues, being involved in the Erasmus program since its first year.The recently started Erasmus + programme and the new challenges behind that were well absorbed by the University of Siena and have been the basis for the implementation of this project.In particular the International Relations Division, the Vicerector for International Relations, the Erasmus Institutional Coordinator and the Office for European Programs for training and mobility were all convinced of the importance to promote the mobility opportunities offered by the project at its best, trying to reach the highest number of potential participants in order to increase quantity and quality of the mobility activities to be carried out.Special attention was paid to the institutional involvment so to have the collaboration, in the achievement of the project goals,of important actors such as the Departments, the Erasmus coordinators and the Office for Didactics which have, all, daily contacts with the students who were the most interesting and numerous participants foreseen in the project.Among the students the project aimed to consolidate the Erasmus for Traineeship activity bringing this to reach a large percentage in the whole scheme of the students mobility activities.Erasmus for Traineeship had already seen a constant and sure increase in the number of participants in the last five years but of course the academic year 14/15 saw one of the most impressive increase, thanks to a good promotional campaign about the importance of this esperience and to the procedure of selection of candidates which allowed students to apply all along the year with five different deadlines and possibility to start the mobility at any tme of the year.Several activities were carried out to promote students mobility in general: information about the 14/15 Erasmus for studies and for Traineeship Calls were given through students mailing lists, news about Erasmus and about the project were published on the University of Siena website and on the Facebook profile and infodays were organized during the year.The Office for European Programs for training and mobility staff has assisted to an increase of the xpression of interest by the students toward the Erasmus mobility opportunities, both through the number of daily presences at the International Desk and the number of e-mail messages received asking for information about mobility issues.One clear result of the increased interest by the student, which was one of the main objective of the project, was the higher number of applications which were presented in the frame of the 14/15 Erasmus for studies Call so as the already mentioned increase in the number of participants to the Erasmus for Traineeship mobility activities.Another important objective behind the project was the increase in the quality of the mobility activities performed by the students, mainly in terms of credits achieved abroad and fully recognised at the home University. To improve this aspect some changes have been made in 2015 in the didactical activies recognition procedure; these changes have been introduced on the initiative of the International Relations Division and have been discussed with the Offices for Didactics and with the Departments so to improve the procedure under any possible respect and to avoid problems in the management of the documents that are necessary for recognition (Learning Agreement). A good dissemination campaign was made about the updated recognition procedure among all the stakeholders. The benefits of this initiative will be hopefully valid alos for the next years in the frame of similar projects.The other kinds of participants in the project, others from the students, were the staff of the University of Siena. The Erasmus Staff Training mobility opportunity was completely reserved to not teaching staff of the University of Siena. This decision was taken because there were numerous person, within the administrative personnel, who showed strong interest to participate.The impact of mobility both for teaching and training purposes was very good in terms of enhancing collaboration with host Universities and organizations as the staff referred to the Office for European Programs for training and mobility, together with a general high level of satisfaction of the participants.For inbound mobility, which is traditionally, as students are concerned, higher in number than the outbound one, many activities were organized and carried out by the Welcome Office of the International Relations Division. Good examples are the Welcome Days at the beginning of each semesters help students to be soon oriented in the town and in the University and Italian Language course offered to incoming students. Assistance and support, with respect to all the relvant aspects of mobility, were offered, to all the inbound partcipants.

This is a project for higher education student and staff mobility between Programme Countries and Partner Countries. Please consult the website of the organisation to obtain additional details.

The development of the project was carried out thanks to the collaboration among the administrative and teaching staff of the University of Siena. In particular, the International Relations Division, which incorporates the International Mobility Office, coordinated the activities for the project implementation, taking advantage of advices and support of the Erasmus Coordinators as well as colleagues of other offices involved in the student career management.Throughout the year, several promotional activities were held in order to stimulate the participation of the students of all the disciplines and the 15 Departments in the Erasmus for studies mobility. Meetings took place at the Rectorate building and at the different Department seats presenting the opportunities offered by the Erasmus programme, the credits recognition procedure and bonus planned in the didactic regulations. All the communication media at our disposal were used to promote the Erasmus for studies 16/17 mobility (websites, Facebook, University Newsletter, e-mail). These efforts resulted in a significant increase in the number of the Erasmus for studies participants which helps to keep high the motivation of the people involved in the mobility management.The Erasmus for traineeship mobility confirmed its very positive trend with a significant increase in the number of participants. The International Mobility Office invested many resources so that both the students and host organizations’ training experiences were positive and fruitful. The increase in the number and type of host organisations widened the choice/offer and the positive outcomes made the institutions available to welcome new trainees from the University of Siena.The Teaching Staff mobility maintained a positive trend and success in terms of meeting expectations and realization of the teaching programmes. The Staff Training mobility evidenced a significant increase in numbers with the participation of staff who experienced this mobility for the first time.The contacts settled by all the staff raised a high interest for new didactic, research and exchange collaborations. In addition, basis were created to sign new bilateral agreements for student and staff’s mobility.

The project implementation involved numerous structures, teaching and administrative staff of the University of Siena.The International Relations Division and the Office for European Training and Mobility prgrammes in particular, managed all the project's stages, strongly supported by other offices with special regard to the Students offices of the Departments, to the Informatics Service and to the Departmental Coordinators, besides of the Erasmus Institutional Coordinator.The opportunity of the Erasmus mobility for studies was promoted among the students in order to stimulate their participation from all the different subject areas and from all the fifteen Departments .Many initiatives were organized during all the project year with the aim to inform about the advantages of a study period abroad including the possibility to have full recognition of the didactical activities carried out in a foreign University.All the available on-line instruments for promotion and information have been used to reach the highest number of students (website, Facebook, University of Siena Newsletter..), especially on the occasion of the launch of the 2015/2016 Erasmus for studies Call. This resulted in an increase of the number of applications which were received by the deadline (February 2015).However, the final total number of the grantees, in the frame of the Erasmus for studies activity, did not show, in the end, to be higher than the previous year due to two main reasons: loss of some applicants for the high concentration of requests for the same Erasmus destination and number of renounces to the scholarship received by the Office during the project year.The other category of participants in the Erasmus activities concerned students carrying out an internship period abroad.In this last case the number of partcipants increased confirming the trend of the last years. The Office for European Training and Mobility prgrammes dedicated time and resources to favour the positive results of the internship experiences both for the trainees and for the host organizations which were of many different kinds and located all over Europe.The mobility, included in the project, of teaching staff of the University of Siena confirmed, more or less, the same numbers of the previous year and reported a very good level of success as it met the expectations and allowed the realization of the foreseen teaching programmes.The Erasmus for training mobility did not report the same number of the previous year; there was a decrease due to the fact that possible staff interested to apply had to preapre a training programme of one month at least as it eas steted by the Staff training evaluation Committee. This decision cut out some possible grantees who could not face such a long period of training abroad.However both teaching and not teaching Erasmus mobility came out from positive and fruitful contacts which will be used also for further collaborations and good paractices exchange.