CAPA’s Advanced Italian Language and Internship Program has been designed for Italian language majors or students who have a high level of competency in Italian with at least 4 semesters of Italian language completed. This program offers a blend of academic courses in Italian, advanced Italian language courses, fine arts courses and an internship in your chosen field.

The mission of this program is to enable participants to achieve a high level of intercultural and language competency and to create a transformative experience for students working and studying in Italy. Florence has been a magnet to visitors for centuries, but those drawn to its beauty and inspiration seldom acclimate into Italian life, society and culture. The CAPA program provides students with the tools to achieve genuine cultural integration.

Applicants should pay close attention to course requirements listed below before applying for this program.

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Please download and complete both the Florence program application and the internship application.

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	Tuition for 13–16 credits for all courses and internships.
	Transfer credit from the University of Minnesota.
	Housing for program dates in local family homestay with two meals per day.
	Internship placements and professional supervision.
	Florence bus transportation pass.
	Excursions to Siena and San Gimignano.
	Provision of the CAPA My Education calendar of local cultural activities.
	Roundtrip airport transfers with CAPA staff.
	Ongoing support and advising from the CAPA program staff.
	Travel and health insurance.
	24 hour emergency care and crisis management.

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The University of Minnesota provides transfer credit for both courses and internships. Tuition is included in the program fees.

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	Students will have the opportunity to work in internship placements specially tailored to their needs and strengths.
	Students work with local Italian people, enhancing their resume; they will build professional skills and gain new ones; as well as develop Italian language skills.
	CAPA is one of the only internship providers in Florence with an extensive network of internship sites available in businesses of every kind, as well as nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations. Sample sites include but are not limited to: Science History Institute and Museum of the History of Science Fashion Design IDRUS Gioielli – Jewelry Design Education Kindergarten Art History Conservation Soprintendenza Archeologica Toscana Management Marketing Fashion Design Gucci Fine Arts Music Administration Teatro Comunale Art History Fine Arts Firenze Musei

Click here to see more CAPA Florence internship sites.

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As a whole, the entire CAPA staff is very professional, very helpful, always available, and makes me feel right at home abroad. Also, what a fabulous internship they found me! I love it, and it is giving me incredible field work experience I could probably not receive in the United States!

-CAPA Student, Spring 2008

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Students applying must be competent in Italian and have four semesters of Italian instruction at university level as a minimal entrance requirement; they will be expected to put language theory into practice at every level. A minimum grade point average (GPA) of 2.5 is required.

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	Students are required to live with an Italian family for the duration of the semester.
	4 credit Intensive Italian for Interns language course.
	3 credit Internship and Internship course.
	2 (or more) additional courses: One of these must be a contextual course taught in Italian, either Area Studies: Contemporary Italian Society or Great Works of Italian Literature. Students are encouraged to take both courses in Italian.
	The remaining course(s) can be chosen from the general course offerings in English on the CAPA Florence Program. Course descriptions and syllabi are located at the end of this page. Call the CAPA Student Services line at  800-793-0334 with any questions about the courses.

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	Intensive language immersion is achieved through holistic methodology; this combines the internship experience with comparative research of the Italian workplace to help students adapt to, analyze and compare Italian business language and culture with other countries’ work ethics and practices.
	Participants will study advanced Italian language, Area Studies or Great Works in Italian Literature, and will have the opportunity to choose from a list of contextual courses taught in English such as Renaissance Art History, Psychology and History.
	By living with an Italian family, each participant will experience cultural immersion and get to practice their Italian language skills on a daily basis.
	By participating in the internship, participants will find themselves further immersed in the Italian language environment of Florence.

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Students will participate in CAPA’s signature My Education events and lectures, which engage students with the complex and fascinating ways the Italian people live and think. They will also have opportunities to volunteer in the community and to learn about and debate contemporary issues in Italy such as immigration, politics and religion. These co-curricular activities form an integral part of the academic work, assessment and research in the internship course.

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 -CAPA Student, Fall 2007

This is a great program opportunity for students, and I am very pleased CAPA is able to offer such a program to college students to submerge themselves in a different culture and to broaden horizons for many young adults.

 -CAPA Student, Spring 2008

I highly recommend interning while abroad to any student wanting to maximize their study abroad experience. Working in a foreign office not only provides amazing skill development, but also allows you to become better acquainted with the culture.

-CAPA Student, Fall 2006

I had outstanding teachers who truly want the students to excel. The professors do a wonderful job of being available to us and are a great Italian resource.

-CAPA Student, Fall 2007

I have a much better understanding of Florence, of the Italian culture and the way that Italians live, along with their customs.      

-CAPA Student, Spring 2008

To enroll in this program, candidates must have completed 4 semesters of Italian language.

CAPA will administer pre-departure and onsite language assessment for all students for internship placements.

Each student will be required to participate in the following:

• Housing in a homestay with an Italian family
• 4 credit Intensive Italian for Interns language course
• 3 credit Internship (135 hours) and Internship course (18 hours)
• 2 (or more) additional courses (Section B): at least ONE of which must be either Area Studies: Contemporary Italian Society (taught in Italian) or Great Works of Italian Literature (taught in Italian) – both courses in Italian may be taken.

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Section A: Mandatory courses
Click to Download Syllabus for both mandatory courses.

Florence Internship Course: PELA (Perspectives in Experiential Learning Abroad)
(3 credits, with the internship)
Click to Download Syllabus
The objectives of the course are to develop students’ analytical and critical thinking skills in relation to the Italian workplace and cultural environment.  The course will also help to improve the students’ communication skills to enable them to adequately cope in an Italian-speaking business environment.  Students will work on the development of both oral and written comprehension with a practical focus of integrating the use of business language.  This will contribute to a better understanding of cross-cultural comparisons of business environments in Italy and the United States. This course forms the vital academic and credit-bearing component of the internship experience in Florence.

Intensive Italian for Interns: Language Course for Internship Program
(4 credits)
Click to Download Syllabus
This is a proficiency-based course designed for students who have already taken four semesters of Italian. The Intensive Italian for Interns course is formed through a “grammar in use” approach to the Italian language and the development of language competencies (speaking and listening) as well as the expansion of the vocabulary. For the writing section, coursework will be related to each student’s internship.

The lessons will be held in Italian and students will be required to participate actively, expressing their ideas and opinions during in-class activities such as readings and discussions of selected materials (including newspapers, magazines and videos), in-class reports, presentations and role-plays related to increasingly complex situations. Special attention will be paid to the improvement of the language in a socio-economic context. The internship and this course together will motivate the student to acquire a deeper, more complex understanding of his/her work placement. The etiquette of Italian letter writing, emails, workplace “jargon,” and business terminology will also be focused on.

Section B:

Area Studies: Contemporary Italian Society, taught in Italian
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course will provide an introduction to the cultures and civilization of Italy from a chronological and thematic perspective. The course is designed to increase students' knowledge of Italian life, customs, and society from an intercultural perspective. Therefore, the first part of the semester will cover the main cultural and historical developments in Italy, from its formation to the present time. The second part of the semester will review current cultural, historical and political concerns, such as religion, immigration, or the new economy under the euro. Activities and out of class visits will be integrated into class lectures, allowing students to participate in debate about contemporary topics in the media.

Great Works of Italian Literature (taught in Italian)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course will analyze a selection of the greatest works of Italian literature in their original language (with English translations available). The approach will be a dynamic review of literary aspects such as the plot, characterization, the narrator’s point of view, the language used, the historical context, the stylistic devices etc. The course will be examining the range of Italian literary genres in their social and cultural context.

Extracts from Dante's Divine Comedy, Boccaccio's Decameron, Manzoni’s The Betrothed, will be read in their original language.

The course will also cover prose works of modern and contemporary authors such as Calvino and Eco, and poets such as Pascoli, D'Annunzio and Montale.

The following courses are taught in English:

International Business
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The objective of this course is to introduce the student to the analysis of the global economy. The course has four main topics:

• The global economy as the prevalent economic system of modern times; first and second globalization; the global economy after September 11th.
• The international trade in the global era; the importance of the Bretton Woods system. The international economic institutions; free trade and protectionism.
• The international finance and the information technology revolution.
• The end of Fordism and the new industrial processes.

Political and Economic History of Europe in the 20th Century
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course offers a general survey of the 20th Century History of Europe with a focus on the major political and economic processes and events. It also pays attention to two correlated issues – the national and the international factors. It particularly seeks to shed light on the way in which European development influenced the national and international contexts and, inversely, to document how national and international factors conditioned European dynamics. The analysis, thus, highlights the regressive dynamics of Europe from a world-scale perspective. The beginning of the 20th Century marked the crisis of Empires and colonial powers. A second significant shift occurred after the Second World War with the emergence of a bipolar world order, with the division of power between the USA and USSR. A third one was registered in 1989, when the way to a global world was opened.

Cross Cultural Psychology
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course will help students gain a better understanding of the ways in which culture and human psyche interact, enhancing their ability to recognize and evaluate variations in human behavior across cultures and ethnic groups. In order to achieve these goals, the course will begin by reviewing briefly the history of psychology and the main themes of general and social psychology, moving towards the theoretical and methodological foundation of cross-cultural psychology.

The course will discuss several basic questions of cross-cultural psychology, such as: What is culture? What is ethnicity? How can we apply cultural psychology to understand and deal with real life cultural conflicts or ethnical tensions? It will also focus on questions regarding the effects of Italian culture-specific phenomena on human cognition, motivation, emotion and social interaction.

Art History -  “The City of Florence and the History of Italian Art from Antiquity to Baroque” (SPRING only)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course introduces students to a broad range of painting, sculpture, and architecture in Florence. It views Florence as an ideal setting for formal discussions which deal with the fine arts and architecture produced in Italy from the Etruscan and Roman civilizations to the Baroque period. Discussion will center on how works of art were made, their style, and how they communicate intellectual meaning. The student will analyze the interrelationship between people’s creative achievements and their society. In other words, students must understand a work of art in the social, historical, and artistic context of Florence and Italy.
The course, which will have a cultural, historical and art-oriented approach, focuses on the following topics:

• The territory of Florence, Etruscan civilization and art
• The origins of Florence and the Roman culture
• Late Medieval Florence: religious and mercantile society’s artistic production
• Florence, the cradle of Renaissance Art
• Florence and High Renaissance
• Florence and Mannerism
• Florence and Baroque

Art History – “The City of Florence and the History of Italian Art from Early Renaissance to Early 20th century” (FALL only)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course introduces students to a broad range of painting, sculpture, and architecture in Florence. It views Florence as an ideal setting for formal discussions which deal with the fine arts and architecture produced in Italy from the dawn of the Renaissance to the Modern period. Discussion will center on how works of art were made, their style, and how they communicate intellectual meaning. The student will analyze the interrelationship between people’s creative achievements and their society. In other words, students must understand a work of art in the social, historical, and artistic context of Florence and Italy.

The course, which will have a cultural, historical and art-oriented approach, focuses on the following topics:

• Late Medieval Florence: The Dawn of the Renaissance
• Florence and High Renaissance, Mannerism and the Baroque
• Romanticism and Neoclassicism
• The Macchia Movement and Divisionism
• Futurism

Renaissance Art History (SPRING only)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This intensive course introduces students to a broad range of painting, sculpture, and architecture in Florence focused around the pivotal period of the Renaissance. Beginning with the great projects of the Middle Ages that defined the religious and political centers of the city, attention focuses on major monuments of the Renaissance. To take full advantage of the opportunities available for the study of art in Florence, most classes are held in museums, churches, and piazzas. Florence is our classroom. Topics for discussion include the cross-cultural fertilization of artistic ideas, how women, the poor, and children were depicted in Renaissance art, conflicting ideas regarding patronage, and how works of art construct religious, political, gender, and class identities. This course analyzes the interrelationship between people’s creative achievements and their society. In other words, students must understand a work of art in the social, artistic, and historical context of medieval and renaissance Florence.

The Real and the Fantastic: The Twentieth-Century Italian Novel (SPRING only)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The course is a survey of Italian prose fiction from the end of the 19th Century to the early 1990s. Authors such as Giovanni Verga, Italo Svevo, Luigi Pirandello and Dacia Maraini have been chosen in order to provide significant examples of the main trends in Italian novel writing, from realism to modernism to neo-realism and beyond. The course will also introduce students to the socio-historical context in which the different trends have risen and developed. The formal solutions and the themes of the novels will therefore be discussed with special emphasis on the peculiarity of Italian cultural history. Particular attention will be paid to the geography of the Italian literary imagination, which may prove particularly interesting for students who are planning to travel around Italy during their semester in Florence. 

Medieval and Renaissance Italian Literature: Dante, Boccaccio, Ariosto (FALL only)
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The course will introduce students to the history of Italian Literature, focusing on great masterpieces (in English translation) from the 14th to the 16th century. A multidisciplinary approach, dealing with social, political, historical and philosophical implications, will provide further understanding by placing literary works in a comprehensive cultural context. Special emphasis will be placed on the impact of Italian literature in European culture in pre-modern age, stressing the broad influence of Dante's Divine Comedy, Boccaccio's Decameron and Ariosto's Orlando Enraged. The course provides students with the elementary background knowledge needed to appreciate the relevance of a few, selected authors as well as an adequate knowledge of their works in terms of form, structure, style, imagery and themes. Students will also learn to distinguish among a variety of poetic and prose kinds.

Beginning Composition Drawing
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The course will take the students from a beginning or intermediate level through the various steps of approaching drawing: tools, composition, art subjects and different media. Individual guidance will be given to more advanced students, helping them to develop their personal style. Students are encouraged to take advantage of studio hours to complete all their assignments and to develop their personal method of working. All students will be required to keep a neat and updated notebook with information provided during the demo-lectures. In addition, students should keep a sketchbook as testimony of their preparatory and observational work done while they have been in Florence. Sketchbooks, as well as homework, will be checked weekly and discussed in class in order to monitor each student’s effort, progress, application of techniques and their ability to filter visual information. During the second half of the course, students - in agreement with the teacher - will work on various drawing projects, which will lead to their final grade along with drawings and homework assignments. The syllabus may be modified to meet the students’ artistic needs.

Beginning Figurative Sculpture
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
Figurative sculpture is a basic studio course designed for beginners and intermediate students, which explores the skills and techniques necessary to approach clay modeling. Although it is an introductory course, more advanced students will be given the opportunity of individual guidance. Students are encouraged to exploit class activity since a technical mastery of the medium can only be gained through constant commitment and application. Students will acquire a theoretical awareness through the stimuli provided by slide shows and the visits to the most important sculptures in Florence. Students will visit these works during the week. Students will have a sketchbook in order to document at least one work per visit.

Beginning Watercolor
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The course will take the students from a beginning or intermediate level through the various steps of approaching watercolor: tools, composition and art subjects. Class work will intensely focus on learning to mix color in order to explore the potential of the medium. Students will be taught how to identify subject matter which is suitable to watercolor. Individual guidance will be given to more advanced students, helping them to develop their personal style. Students are encouraged to take advantage of studio hours to complete all their assignments and to develop their personal method of working. All students will be required to keep a neat and updated notebook with information which was provided during the demo-lectures. In addition, students should keep a sketchbook as testimony of their preparatory and observational work done while they have been in Florence. Sketchbooks, as well as homework, will be checked weekly and discussed in class in order to monitor each student’s effort, progress, application of techniques and their ability to filter visual information.

Beginning Life Drawing
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
The course is structured to introduce drawing, starting from the basic techniques to more advanced approaches and ideas. The goal of this course is to give students the ability to reproduce “reality” (objects, human figures etc.) and by becoming familiar with the structure of the figure and certain objects. It is particularly important that students learn to observe and in order to do so, they will be taught how to develop new ways to look at nature.

Beginning Oil Painting
(3 credits) Click to Download Syllabus
This course is structured to introduce oil painting starting from the basic techniques and then introducing new approaches and ideas. The course takes students through the various steps of approaching drawing: materials, perspective, negative and positive space, pictorial subjects, and different media in color, with a strong emphasis on oil painting methods (as well as watercolor).

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