The East Campus of USI & SUPSI was offcially inaugurated

The University of Lugano (USI) and the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI) have officially inaugurated the East Campus with a ceremony held today at the building located in Via la Santa 1 in Viganello, attended by the President of the Confederation Guy Parmelin and by several representatives of the cantonal and municipal authorities.The event, broadcast live via streaming from the multi-purpose hall which remained closed to the public, was opened with official with welcome speeches by the presidents of the two academic institutions, Monica Duca Widmer for the USI Council and Alberto Petruzzella for the SUPSI Council, followed by the Rector of USI Boas Erez, the Director General of SUPSI Franco Gervasoni and the municipal and cantonal authorities, as well as the President of the Confederation Guy Parmelin, followed by the greetings of the Rector of USI Boas Erez, the Director General of SUPSI Franco Gervasoni and the municipal and cantonal authorities, the mayor of Lugano Marco Borradori and the Director of the Department of Education, Culture and Sport (DECS) Manuele Bertoli. Federal Councillor Guy Parmelin who expressed «The new Campus is a further open area, a meeting place, a venue for education and for transmitting knowledge, research and production of new research, to the benefit of everyone»

Monica Duca Widmer, President of the USI Council, «It is a challenge that has been won, by those who, with foresight, desired that Italian-speaking Switzerland could also become a leader - and not just a spectator - in the cultural and economic evolution of the country.»

In his speech, Alberto Petruzzella, President of the SUPSI Council, recalled the beginning of this ambitious project: «It all began with a revolutionary idea of Mauro Dell’Ambrogio in 2004: to put USI and SUPSI under the same roof. It took 17 years, but we did it».

The project envisaged the merger in the new building of the SUPSI General Management with the Department of Innovative Technologies and the Department of Economics and Social Affairs, a fifth Faculty of USI is yet to be developed, the Conservatory of Southern Switzerland, the Swiss Centre for Scientific Computing and the Swiss Federal Institute for Vocational Training. « The spirit remained of the initial idea, but in the end the growing space requirements greatly reduced the number of institutions involved. This is simply because USI and SUPSI have grown spectacularly in the last 25 years». Marco Borradori, Mayor of the City of Lugano, declared: «USI and SUPSI are giving the city a new courtyard.

The piazza is the very essence of the city: it welcomes movement and life. The new courtyard, almost as large as the Piazza della Riforma, together with its portico is an invitation to stop, stroll and pass citizens, as if it were an extension of the city. «Square» is a word that becomes a place: the courtyard enclosed within the East Campus is a new space, but also an ideal, a symbol of life. The city continuously feeds on spaces and opportunities to meet. Overlooking the courtyard of the new Campus there are also a nursery school and a bar, the barometer of vitality that belongs to a community that wants to be open. We will see how the neighborhoods will embrace this new space and perhaps how the relationship between the University and the city may change, what new opportunities will arise.» Finally, State Councillor and DECS Director Manuele Bertoli stressed: «I hope that the «campus» will become a place of freedom, cultivation, and growth, maturity.

The East Campus is located in Lugano, in Via la Santa 1, Viganello district. It houses classrooms, offices and laboratories for training and research of the Faculty of Informatics and the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences of USI, of the Department of Innovative Technologies of SUPSI, and of the Dalle Molle Institute for Artificial Intelligence Studies (IDSIA), a joint USI-SUPSI institute. The facility is also equipped with various common areas, the aforementioned multi-purpose hall, an exhibition area, a canteen, a nursery school and spaces for sports activities. It accommodates about 600 employees, 1,000 students in primary education and 800 students in further education. The architectural project, entitled Zenobia, is the work of architects Simone Tocchetti and Luca Pessina from Ticino, who were at the event to show the building to guests and illustrate their project. Following the official ceremony, representatives of the authorities and institutional guests were able to visit some spaces of the Campus, in strict compliance with the current protection measures. At the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences a meeting was held with the Dean Prof. Giovanni Pedrazzini and some students of the new Master in Medicine. The guests then visited the Faculty of Informatics where the Dean Prof. Antonio Carzaniga presented several researchers who have obtained the prestigious European research funds ERC. The guided tour continued at the laboratories of the Department of Innovative Technologies of SUPSI, where the director Prof. Emanuele Carpanzano presented the training and research activities carried out within the various engineering disciplines.