Health and the Environment Are Priorities for Bocconi Students
Concern for health and, at the same time, the environment, are what made Bocconi students express a preference for safe and ecological means of transportation. These are some of the findings emerging from the survey on mobility in times of Covid-19 answered by approximately 2,700 Bocconi University students, and promoted by the Network of Italian Universities for Sustainability (RUS) and sponsored by Conference of Rectors of Italian Universities (CRUI). The initiative was embraced by Bocconi University in the period between July and September 2020.
The survey analyzed the behavior of 85,000 people representing the academic population of more than 50 Italian universities (students, faculty, staff), thanks to the compilation of an online questionnaire. There were two hypothetical scenarios: a) the virus is almost eradicated and infections are reduced; b) the virus is still dangerous: contagion has slowed down but continues to sperad.
"Obviously, we must take into account the fact that answers to surveys were collected to before the second wave of the pandemic", explains Manlio De Silvio, coordinator of the Sustainability Committee of Bocconi University and researcher in Corporate Social Responsibility at the Department of Management and Technology, "But the data are certainly significant. The answers the students had to give referred to two alternative scenarios, one in which the virus was eradicated, the other in which it was still active and dangerous "
And the data that emerged were immediately interesting, as De Silvio himself reports: "In general, 67% of interviewees live within a 5-km radius from the University, and usually, even before of the pandemic, they went to Bocconi on foot (more than 41%), or by sustainable means of transportation such as bicycles or electric scooters, either owned or shared via digital apps, or by buses, trams, and the subway. The pandemic, for health and safety reasons, has contributed to further orient student choice towards walking and cycling (about +10%), where this is possible and safe, for example thanks to the presence of quiet pedestrian paths or bike lanes closed to motorized traffic. The interest in the use of bicycles is such that the University, in addition to the recent large-scale installation of new racks, is continuing to identify new spaces to ensure a safe parking for bikes and thus satisfy a need felt by students and the whole Bocconi community".
The willingness to change habits also concerns travel frequency to and from the University: "Before Covid, 68% of the students interviewed declared that they commuted to Bocconi at least five days a week", continues De Silvio, "which is evidence of not only of the educational value of the campus experience, but of also its social dimensions. This percentage remains almost unchanged in the event of the optimistic pandemic scenario among those interviewed, but drops drastically to 19% in the other eventuality, proof of a certain sensitivity to the issue of safety".