dstark

It looks to me like the program costs $6,000 plus OOS. Maybe, I'll just send her over there without the school. You can drink for a lot less.

momrath

dstark, this is an arts-focused, low key (and not too costly) group that organizes month long programs, mostly in Florence, but also offering travel to other areas. It's a fair balance of fun and learning, not excessively academic, but still intellectually inspired. The people who run the program are educators. They are well organized, good communicators and very handson.

http://www.artis-tours.org/italy.html

dstark

momrath, this isn't going to fit my kid, but it looks like a great program and maybe will fit a lurker or two.

backhandgrip

Hi Dstark!
I studied in Italy many years ago for 3 summers.
1.-My first suggestion is to learn some of the language before you go. Most people there do know some English and all shopkeepers are fluent in English, however to truly appreciate the Italian culture I think it matters so much to know some of the language. However you will pick it up also.
2. Try to find a program that mixes you with local students. Again this will teach you so much about Italian culture.
3. Look for a program that may be based in a smaller Italian town that makes trips to large cities rather than based in a big city with trips to smaller towns . Rome, any way you look at it is overwhelming.
4. In my opinion foreign born profs can add so much more to your experience and teach you so much not only about Italy but about the European perspective towards Italy and it's culture.

The first summer I studied the Etruscans in Italy and worked on an Etruscan archelogical dig recieving history and art credits.We went to Tarquinia and Volterra and views many tombs along the western coast. The second summer I took credit in Medieval Italian art and we dug up an early Medieval monestary now in ruin. The monestary was on the site near a Roman road and bridge in Tuscany and wildlife such as boars, vipers, etc. surrounded us.(My advice, don't sit on the grass in a field painting with watercolors!) The third year I was the artist, that is drew the artifacts found from the previous years dig. By this time I knew the language better and a number of us traveled after the excavation. Spend maybe a week or two, in Rome there is so much to see there including the Vatican.

backhandgrip

Just read the other posts. Yes, I would look into Perugia if it were me considering something for my child/student.

leanid

backhand,

Sounds like you had a wonderful time of it in Italy. I, too, have spent time there (about five years in all) and it is probably THE haven for those pursuing art, art history, architecture, music and history!

There is also something about Italy, maybe a combination of atmosphere and culture, that gives it a timeless quality - a result perhaps of its antiquity and something that can only be had by the long, long journey of a civilization that once ruled the known world two thousand years ago, and can now bask in its glorious past.

To me it offers the reassurance that man, despite his seemingly endless capacity for getting it wrong, will still survive and will also have countless examples, made by him, to show how he got it right from time to time!

Will the same be said for the USA in the year 4000?

dstark

leanid, backhandgrip, thanks for the information.