Observatory “Rethinking Student Housing” — ABC Department, Politecnico di Milano
By: Martino Mocchi
Tags: Observatory, University, Politecnico Di Milano, Students Life, Student Housing

In October 2020 the ABC Department of Politecnico di Milano launched 14 interdisciplinary “Observatories” to deal with COVID-19 emergency, understanding the role of built environment in the post-pandemic phase. Dwelling, designing, housing take on a new face, requiring new attitudes, innovative approaches and solutions.

Within this initiative, a working group made up of me, Prof. Oscar Eugenio Bellini and Prof. Matteo Gambaro have founded the Student Housing Observatory “Rethinking Student Housing”, with the purpose of fostering new paradigms for student residencies.

Vilfredo Pareto student residence, Politecnico di Milano

The Student Housing Observatory affirms as a place for promoting activities, debates and research around student housing infrastructures, concerning planning, design, and management phases. The Observatory starts from the analysis of the weaknesses and difficulties that are characterizing the COVID-19 scenario, prospecting new visions in the medium-long period.

The Observatory is a new public body, reinforcing the network of the stakeholders, in the logic of sharing and open dialogue. This approach is in line with the position already expressed by CRUI - Conferenza dei rettori delle università italiane(President Morzenti Pellegrini) and the Lombardy Regional Observatory on Housing.

This initiative aims at consolidating and extending the established relationships by the members of the group within the Politecnico di Milano bodies (Rectorate, Development and Corporate Relations Area, Infrastructure and Services Management, Technical Building Area) and with external stakeholders. In this regard, the first step will be the publication of the book “Vivere e Abitare l’Università” (Living and dwelling University), which re-elaborates the results of the Seminar held at Politecnico di Milano on May 5th 2019. On that occasion, many representatives of national Institutions and Universities discussed the prospects of Law No. 338/2000, introducing new models for managing student housing, overcoming the idea of “quantitative standards” in favour of more articulated indicators for evaluating the quality of students living.

The approach of the Observatory combines theoretical approach with practical experimentations and field works, as highlighted by the involvement of the group members in the redevelopment of Leonardo da Vinci residence (Politecnico di Milano), their participation in the OFF-CAMPUS initiative (funded by PoliSocial program) and in the European project HOME - Home Of Mobile Europeans, winner of the Erasmus+ 2019 call.

The Observatory is an essential player to gather the skills and know-how resulted from a decade-long work, in an inclusive and multidisciplinary perspective. In a first phase, the goal is to materialize actions for answering the new needs raised by sanitary emergency, at a later stage to focus on strategies and methods for improving our way of living and the value of built heritage.

The aims of the Observatory can be summarized in 10 points, which express the core topics of the inquiry:

Safe residencies and sense of belonging Morpho-techno-typological and functional innovation Relationships between students and local inhabitants (Software) Continuity among students and urban facilities (Hardware) Educational potential and perspectives New forms of housing continuity for special users Informal socialization Public and private supply ICT for Student Housing New management models

The Observatory on Student Housing focuses on a theme with great cultural, social and infrastructural potential, still characterized by an interpretative and design-level backwardness. The emergency phase has clearly brought out these limits, highlighting the opportunities and the improvements that could result from a proper consideration of student housing: for the construction of the human and professional figure of the “student”, for the increasing attractiveness of Universities, for the activation of physical and social regeneration of the city.