Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

Inside Off campus Nolo, the space to bring the University closer to the neighborhood and the city

Milan, September 29 2020 – New life under the banner of teaching and sociability, without forgetting the commercial function, for the covered municipal market in Viale Monza 54.

It was inaugurated this morning, in the presence of the Councilor for Labor Policies, Productive Activities and Commerce, Cristina Tajani, the Rector of the Polytechnic of Milan, Ferruccio Resta and the representatives of the Associations active in the area, Off campus Nolo.
The space, located inside the covered municipal market, was born from the collaboration between the Administration and the University and will allow teachers, researchers, students of the University together with the inhabitants and associations to develop innovative teaching and responsible research activities and co-planning in favor of the community and the development of the neighborhood.

Off campus Nolo will host an observatory on issues related to the regeneration and reactivation of neighborhoods, educational laboratories and workshops, seminars and lessons open to the neighborhood, exhibitions and exhibitions, public events and an archive open to the entire area.

“Today's opening - the councilor for Labor Policies, Productive Activities and Commerce Cristina Tajani - is part of the broader strategy conducted in recent years by the Administration to promote the evolutionary transformation of the covered municipal markets aimed at making them not only point of exchange of goods but also of ideas and relationships, through forms of hybridization between classic commercial activities, however prevalent, and activities with social, cultural, aggregative and recreational purposes. The collaboration with the Polytechnic of Milan - continues Tajani - demonstrates how the widespread network of covered municipal markets can represent a real seismograph to capture the evolution of the city and set policies capable of responding to the changing needs of citizens and neighborhoods as happened for the markets covered in Santa Maria del Suffragio, Lorenteggio, Morsenchio, Wagner and Lagosta".

“Off campus is the demonstration of the active and concrete participation of the Polytechnic of Milan in the dynamics of city growth. A university attentive to social challenges, close to the needs of the territories and their communities. It is the expression of the positive impact that arises from interaction and comparison, from the experimentation of new ideas and from dialogue – comments Ferruccio Resta, Rector of the Polytechnic of Milan -. Nolo is the second landing point of the initiative which we intend to extend to other city districts in the future. Hence the fundamental agreement with the municipal administration, the result of a joint commitment in tracing and carrying out shared actions".

The one in the Nolo district is the second Off campus space of the Polytechnic opened in the city; the first, in the San Siro district, was inaugurated in April 2019.

Off campus Nolo will operate in synergy with the Department of Design, the School of Design and the School of Architecture, Urban Planning, Construction Engineering of the Polytechnic of Milan and sees the collaboration of Radio Nolo for the creation of a radio space open to the inhabitants and with a program schedule of information, entertainment to and from the neighborhood and media education activities dedicated to every age group, which the radio will also promote thanks to the contribution of the Sottocasa – LaCittàIntorno program of the Cariplo Foundation.

The spaces of Off campus | the Construction site for the suburbs, fall within the spectrum of activities promoted by the social responsibility program of the Polytechnic of Milan Polisocial, deal with social and urban dynamics specific to the contexts in which they are located, representing the "antennas" of the university in the city: places open to the public in which the knowledge produced in the university is made more visible, accessible and usable, returning it and sharing it with citizens in a continuous dialogue between training centers and the territory.

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