Study Abroad Student Reports: Milan, Italy

I had an amazing experience during my three weeks in Italy with the Materials in Milan study abroad. In my opinion, Milan is the perfect city for a study abroad experience because, in many aspects, it is extraordinarily diverse. The city has both very historic areas, like the area around the Duomo, and very modern areas, like the Brera borough close to the Zara neighborhood where we stayed. Correspondingly, while some areas can be touristy, most of Milan is simply a superbly designed city, meaning that we almost always felt safe and unconcerned about tourist traps or inauthenticity. With a great metro system and several other methods of transportation, it was easy to navigate and get around the city. As a very international city, English was prominent on most signs and in most businesses, making the city accessible for non-Italian speakers. Furthermore, with its many large foreign populations, we were able to explore other cultures than Italian and try Filipino, Turkish, and Szechuan food. That diversity and safety make Milan a fantastic place for cultural exploration.

The studying part of the study abroad was also exceptional. The small class and more personal connection to our professor created a great environment where we were able to learn an entire semester’s worth of content with almost no stress or exhaustion. The field trips that we took to manufacturing facilities allowed us to see applications of the course content and generally added excitement and a change of pace to the week. My favorite visit was our tour of the steel tube manufacturer Trafiltubi because as a materials engineering major, I loved seeing the testing equipment that they have and the real application of stress-strain and hardness tests in industry. Part of the course design was journal entries to describe things we had noticed relating to culture, bikes, and materials, which kept us on the lookout for the subtle ways that the course content applies to many aspects of society.

Alongside free time most afternoons, we also had free weekends to plan our own mini trips to other cities in northern Italy. That freedom allowed us to plan a smaller group excursion to the Aoste Valley in the Alps, which ended up being one of the most memorable parts of the trip. The city had tons of Roman ruins, two archeological museums, and generally great small city charm. We did a fifteen-mile hike that was both exhausting and torturous but also super memorable and rewarding. The views and shared experience of the hike made it a grueling 40,000 step experience that I will never regret. Overall, because of the already diverse nature of Milan in combination with the opportunities to travel to other cities in Italy, the trip allowed for tons of cultural exploration and immersion.

The best part of studying abroad, though, was the friends that I made while there. Our small group was like a family, and within it, I found a new group of friends. We are planning to stay in touch and keep up some of the traditions we started on the trip like Super-Smash Brothers nights. We made unforgettable memories with each other and will always be able to reminisce about our various escapades throughout our time in Italy.

During my three week program in Milan, Italy, I had the wonderful opportunity to explore and expand my knowledge on both Italian culture and materials science and engineering from a unique perspective. The city of Milan is unlike any other city in Italy. As the economic center of the country, my initial expectations of life in an Italian city were subverted. Milan is a mix between urban skylines and classic Italian streets. Milan also houses a large international population, containing many different cultures. I took advantage of this to try many different cuisines like Filipino, Japanese, Chinese, Turkish, and Moroccan. Despite a majority of locals being able to speak English, I always took the opportunity to practice the little Italian I knew to better engage with the local culture.

Over the course of the trip, we learned introductory materials science and engineering concepts through traditional lectures but also through different field trips to bicycle manufacturers and processing plants. Examples include observing the cold drawing process for steel tubes at Trafiltubi and assembling a bicycle at Rossignoli. My favorite visit was probably the visit to Passoni, a small scale, luxury bicycle manufacturer that specializes in titanium frames. Seeing the precise craftsmanship and quality of the materials they use was a special treat.

I also had the pleasure of planning my own excursions over the weekends. This allowed me to see Italy through a new lens in the cities of Bologna and Aosta. In Bologna, I was able to explore Italy’s rich gastronomic culture and the city’s beautiful medieval architecture. In Aosta, located in the Aosta Valley, I got to experience what was essentially a completely different culture where the locals speak Valdôtain, a Patois that mixes French with Italian. We got to enjoy the beauty of the Alps and engage with the local culture through our Airbnb host who was a retired Alpino. The smaller scale and more personal feel of the Aosta excursion made it feel extra special.

This past summer, I was given the opportunity to participate in the Materials in Milan study abroad program through the Tickle College of Engineering. During this program, I took Introduction to Materials Science, which was a 3-credit hour course focused on materials used in bicycles. Throughout the program, we went on numerous business visits, we touring the Leonardo da Vinci Museum in Milan, and we went on an overnight trip to Vicenza to see the Giro d’Italia bike race! The business visits allowed us to see all of the engineering and materials processing that goes into crafting a custom bicycle, and helped us apply the concepts we were learning in class. During our visit to Rossignoli, a small custom bike shop, we watched as the employees assembled a bicycle from start to finish, which was such a cool experience!

Since our weekends were free, we made a couple local trips to other parts of Italy. The first weekend, after our trip to Vicenza, we travelled to Venice. We had two days to explore the city and see all of the tourist attractions. The first afternoon we explored the main island and saw some beautiful views of the sunset. The next day, we took a water taxi to a neighboring island, Murano, that specializes in glass blowing and custom glass art! It was such an amazing experience to be able to see the difference in culture between Milan and Venice, and the views over the water were incredible. The second weekend, we travelled to Lake Como. We explored the city of Como, went up the mountain to Brunate, and took a ferry to Bellagio. Como was very different from what we expected, but it was great to be able to experience a bunch of different areas on the lake!

The most surprising part of my experience was how easy it was to navigate public transportation. The metro system within Milan made it so easy to travel around the city and see so many different neighborhoods. Additionally, the train system across the whole country was so easy to navigate, and the tickets were very easy to purchase. It was such a shock to see how easy it was to travel to a different part of the country in just a few hours!

I am so glad I participated in this program! This experience has taught me so much about the differences between our culture and others, and has allowed me learn all about them. I will forever be grateful for my time in Italy and the friendships I made along the way!

For the three weeks following the end of my freshman year of college, I had the pleasure of studying abroad in Milan, Italy. There, I had the opportunity to study and receive credit for an introductory level material sciences class while immersing myself in Italian culture. Having the chance to experience a city both centuries older than America and designed on a human scale with multitudes of public transportation options and walkable sections of town was phenomenal. Milan is also an international city, meaning that Milan represents a multitude of cultures. This allowed me to try meals of many different parts of the world while still being able to converse mostly in English and exist comfortably despite my lack of Italian speaking skills.

A large part of studying abroad is the actual studying. While in Milan, we learned about material sciences and took advantage of the biking culture and local manufacturing to frame and provide consistent real-world examples of what we were learning. To do this, we visited one tubing company, and three local bike shops, all of which I enjoyed. However, my favorite was visiting a company named Rossignoli, where they gave us a hands-on demonstration of the process of going from just a bike frame to a finished product. Afterwards, they let us ride the bike we had just helped build, and it was a special experience. We also visited Passoni, a luxury brand known for their titanium frames and welding techniques, and we were able to catch a leg of the Giro D’Italia, a premier bike race showcasing the technical maximum for bicycles.

One major perk of studying abroad is simply how much free time is built into the schedule to let us explore. Of the three weekends we had in Milan, the first was filled with orientation and exploring Milan. The second weekend, we went to see the Giro D’Italia in Vicenza, leaving a day and a half free, and the final weekend was completely free. This allowed us to explore other cities and regions outside of Milan and get a far better grasp of the Italian regions. For the day and a half we had free, I found myself, along with much of the class, in Venice in complete awe as we got lost in the beautiful architecture and twisting alleys. Then for the three-day weekend, three close friends and I ventured to the Aosta Valley. There we were able to explore the alps and a very different culture than what we saw anywhere else in Italy.

As part of the three-week study abroad program in Milan, we lived in apartments in the Zara neighborhood. During my stay, I appreciated the day-to-day luxuries of living in an international city. The Zara neighborhood felt very local, and we took the metro every day, either to class or to explore other parts of the city. I grew accustomed to the trends and traffic patterns of different stops, anticipating the flood of people in collared shirts and blazers, dressed up to go to their corporate jobs. I got to go grocery shopping and cook many of my meals, as well as try multiple global cuisines.

I visited many of those “must see” tourist hotspots, like the Duomo, Venice, and Como. They were beautiful and constantly bustling but also fed into a perception that the cities just held nameless masses of people that moved around like ants. For this, I am grateful I had time to walk. In Vicenza, we stumbled upon live music for a jazz festival, and a picturesque park filled with all kinds of wildlife. We saw the most tourists in Venice, and although I heard a lot of Italian, I also heard lots of English, French, and Spanish. But even in such a tight packed city, we wandered far enough to where there was no one around, save for an elderly woman who mimed at us to swim in the canals. And on a train home from Venice, we convinced a woman who only spoke Spanish to play Exploding Kittens.

The nature of the business trips was very engaging for me. Rossignoli was especially interactive, as they demonstrated how to assemble bikes traditionally, without the use of power tools. We got to help put the tires together, as well as choose the seat, handles, and tire color. I got to help demonstrate Rossignoli’s method of biomechanic analysis, which they use to tailor the bike frames to the customer. A specialist put stickers on my joints, which then tracked my cycling motion. The results would have been used to find the most ergonomic bike frame for the customer. At Trafiltubi, we witnessed the manufacturing of tubes for bike frames from start to finish. We also heard about the history of the company and their connection to Ferrari and Maserati.

I am so glad I got to go on this trip. The whole experience felt surreal, and it is still hard to comprehend that I was living four thousand miles away. The class size, instruction, and site visits made the material fun and easy to engage in. And beyond the classroom, I got to live, learn, and explore a city with a blend of cultures. I am grateful for the friends I have gained and for the once-in-a-lifetime adventures I went on. I loved my time in Italy, and I encourage anyone who can to go study abroad.

This summer I had an incredible time studying material science in Milan, Italy. The city was a great place to live, with the metro making it easy to get to class and see things that I wanted to see.  I stayed near Porta Nuova, and waking up each morning to the view of its skyscrapers was a breathtaking sight and a great way to start my days. While Milan served as our home base, I got to visit Vicenza, Venice, and Lake Como as well. Because my group explored the places we visited so thoroughly, I felt like I was able to connect with them on a deeper level than most tourists.

One of my favorite parts about Italy was the food. It surprised me how much better everything was; even the lunch meats and cheeses were noticeably higher quality. I shared many meals with other people on the trip, which was a fun and inexpensive way to spend time together by preparing food and sharing stories from the day. The restaurants were also amazing, and the diverse cuisine never got tiring.

Academically, the course was engaging without being overwhelming. We went on some interesting sight visits, but my favorite was a high end bike manufacturer where we saw how they were using carbon fiber and titanium in their new designs. Seeing the actual processes behind the materials we’d been studying made the course content feel way more relevant and immersive.

In the end, what made the trip most impactful was experiencing everything Italy had to offer with my fellow engineers. Traveling and learning with my friends made the trip way more fun, and it made Milan feel like a home away from home. We made a lot of lasting memories, and I felt like I left with a considerably larger knowledge of Italian culture as well as an understanding of material science that has changed how I understand the world.

My study abroad experience was amazing. I took Material Science Engineering in Milan, Italy for three weeks. In those three weeks I gained many memories, friends, and experiences that I will take with me throughout my life. The way the class worked was that we had multiple sessions throughout the week while after class and on the weekends, we had free time to explore our home city or explore anywhere we wanted in Europe. We split into groups based on where we wanted to go, and we got to travel with one another, making plans and decisions the entire time and it was a blast. With my free weekends, I visited Venice and Aosta. Both cities had their own unique architecture and lifestyles. Venice was more traveled to and had multiple places to visit and tour. On the other hand, Aosta is in the Alps, so we got to hike and explore the cities in the mountains. Both experiences were fun and memorable, packed with funny moments and some stressful ones that we can laugh about now.

Based on the name study abroad, the study part cannot be ignored. We had a lot of short class sessions during our time in Italy learning about material properties and bikes. We had a few exams, but it was always fun studying with the group as a whole and having gelato runs when we got done. We had multiple site visits during our three weeks to world famous bike manufacturers and steel tube factories. We focused on bikes because the materials that people use to create bikes significantly changes how light and strong the bike is. Another visit we had was to the Giro d’Italia in Vicenza, Italy. The Giro is a long bike race across all of Italy, and we got to see one of the legs of the race that finished in Vicenza. It was amazing to see how the locals supported all the riders and really immersed themselves in the race. Also, one of the best parts about the class is that it counts for credit hours.

Overall, it was one of the greatest times of my life. What really made it all worth it were the people I met and got to talk to in Italy. The friends I made on the trip, the locals who let me play basketball with them, the people that gave us tours of their companies, the study abroad organizers in Italy were all people that had a significant impact on me. Moments like getting lost in Venice, having Aperitivo with our Airbnb host, and teaching an elderly lady how to play Exploding Kittens were some of the best parts of the trip.

I got to adventure, learn, make mistakes, and have fun in another country with students just like me and I’ll remember that trip forever.