In 2016 the University of Padova and its Language Centre (Centro Linguistico di Ateneo – CLA) became involved in the two-year “Cultura e accoglienza” Project (see Dalziel and Piazzoli in this volume), the aim of which was to encourage around 30 refugees and asylum seekers to pursue university studies by means of a personalized training programme with support from language teachers and tutors. This report first describes some of the main national projects regarding the inclusion of refugee/asylum seekers in Italy and then describes the “Cultura e accoglienza” project, highlighting some of the opportunities and challenges it presented. For the Language Centre this was the very first experience of this kind.

DOI: 10.1515/cercles-2019-0009
ISSN: 2191-611X