Advising and guidance

Advising and guidance refer to all activities aimed at enabling the future student to plan and manage their learning in a way that is consistent with their personal life goals and makes full use of their individual skills and interests to achieve personal fulfilment.
Depending on the stage of the university process at which these activities are carried out, a distinction is made between: Advising: carried out before the choice of course of study, it is aimed at future students and offers support in identifying the course to be undertaken on the basis of individual interests, expectations and aptitudes. In this phase, the various possible scenarios are presented to the future student and the alternatives of the university path are illustrated; Guidance: carried out during the university career, it is aimed at enrolled students and is designed to guide them through the courses of study already undertaken, allowing them to establish a better interaction with the structures and the university context; Career guidance: carried out close to or after graduation, is aimed at graduates or graduating students and is designed to facilitate their introduction into the working environment.

Advising

Advising actions play a decisive role in the complex and articulated process of higher education of the new generations. The choice of a university study path is indeed a very delicate moment in the life of the student who has to make a conscious choice in order to build his or her own life project; shortcomings in advising contribute to an increase in the number of study drop-outs, as well as to slowing down student careers by disproportionately increasing the time it takes to obtain a degree.
The University of Parma pays particular attention to orientation projects aimed at high school students, in order to promote an accurate and in-depth knowledge of the University's course catalogue.
An important network of activities and services, described in the document University Policy for Student Services and coordinated by the Guidance Delegate, is constantly updated and optimised to accompany students throughout their university career.
The Advising Delegates are:
Prof. Daniela Galli Prof. Giancarlo Condello The degree course has appointed six Professors, with the role of tutors, whose task it is to follow the students during their training.

1st year Prof. Daniela Galli, Prof. Elena Ferrari.

2nd year Prof. Ileana Ramazzina.

3rd year Prof. Nicoletta Ronda, Prof. Giuliana Gobbi, Prof. Cosimo Costantino.
Advising includes meetings with secondary school classes, local communities and facilities to disseminate information about the course of study and the profession. Also part of advising are the Open Day and Info Day organised by the University, at which the teaching staff, students and tutors are available to the community for information on training and postgraduate job opportunities.

The service is intended to support students' proper integration in the course of study through, in particular, specific tutoring activities aimed at students enrolled in the first year of the course, as well as to encourage effective career progression by students through, in particular, assistance in the compilation of individual programmes of study, guidance activities aimed at encouraging students to choose the course of study most suited to their characteristics, as well as remedial activities for students experiencing difficulties.

In parallel with strengthening the tools for assessing students' incoming skills, particularly for those with a high drop-out rate, the University provides for remedial teaching actions and ensures adequate tutoring services throughout the university course, calibrated taking into account the assessment mechanisms of the Study Courses, in order to pursue the result of improving their quality, by providing tutors for each individual Study Course.

Orientation and in itinere tutoring, therefore, take on particular significance in view of the growing importance of the improvement and success, from an educational point of view, of regularly enrolled students, an aspect that cannot, however, disregard the initial level of basic skills of incoming students, which contributes significantly to the underperformance of matriculated students. In order to improve specific performance, the university has set out to develop a series of actions aimed at integrating and strengthening the core subject areas, as well as implementing supplementary preparatory and preparatory courses for examinations. In this sense, educational tutoring is able to facilitate the completion of studies on time and, in particular, reduce first-year drop-outs. The aim is to guide and assist students throughout their studies, to make them active participants in the educational process, to remove obstacles to successful attendance, including through initiatives tailored to the needs, aptitudes and requirements of individuals.
Tutoring and tutorials also make it possible to support both the process aimed at increasing the number of students who enrol in the second year of the same degree class having acquired an adequate number of university credits in relation to the cohort of enrolled students in the previous academic year, and the process aimed at increasing the number of graduates who obtain their final degree within the normal duration of the degree course.