On 12 October 2007, AIT President Said Irandoust met with Professor Mario T. Tabucanon, who proposed two new initiatives for collaboration between AIT and Italy - one with Politecnico di Milano (PdM), and one with an Italian business concern, the Danieli Group. The Government of Italy is gearing its development aid, especially in education, to Asia. There will be around 100 scholarships per year from the Government of Italy for foreign students studying at PdM, and Professor Tabucanon suggested the idea to establish a cooperation agreement with AIT (e.g. student exchange, dual degree programs, etc). PdM is the leading technical university in Italy and is world-renowned.
The other initiative is with the Danieli Group, which has its largest overseas operations in Thailand, and is interested in recruiting AIT graduates. Danieli can provide funding for the design and delivery of courses to suit their needs, and are also open to other kinds of cooperation. An Italian delegation, comprising members from PdM and executives from the Danieli Group is scheduled to visit AIT next month at which timer there will be a discussion on how PdM, Danieli Group, and AIT could jointly pursue some of these initiatives.
Professor Tabucanon, who is a United Nations University (UNU) Visiting Professor, has been in contact with Professor S. Kumar, Dean SERD, and is also assisting AIT in the coordination of the 7th Meeting and 3rd Research Colloquium of the Asia-Pacific Regional University Consortium (RUC) on Sustainable Development (under the aegis of UNEP), which is planned to be held at AIT during 24-25 April 2008. RUC is composed of AIT, Griffith University, Nanyang Technological University, Tongji University, University of New South Wales, University of Wollongong, and Yale University. UNU, through its Institute of Advanced Studies (UNU-IAS), is a collaborating UN agency.