Preeyanoot Surinkaew, Thailand

Till now she is the only Buddhist student at the IUS. Metta – as she introduces herself to Westerners, a religious term that means “compassion” – after having studied Buddhism, at the IUS has chosen the Political Studies track.

“I felt the need to open up my horizons... I decided to study Politics and I came to the Sophia University."

Samar Bandak, Jordan

"When I came to study at the Sophia University, I had many questions...  I chose the political studies track and I have begun to enter into a new panorama: I have discovered, for example, that the principle of fraternity can be a real category for politics, alongside that of freedom and equality. I have understood that fraternity is a choice, a response that can heal injustice."

Melchior Nsavyimana, Burundi

Student enrolled in the first year, he's attending the specialization in Political Studies. "After getting a degree in geography, I started to work in the humanitarian support sector and at the same time I also participated in political life..."

Maria Inês Tolentino da Silva, Portugal

That which characterizes studying at the IUS is also the possibility to partake in some initiatives, external in a strict sense, to the academic program, however, strongly connected to the developmental plane of Sophia.

"“Already during the first year, I had been invited to an important ecumenical initiative the IUS participated in: ‘Together for Europe'... Today, if I were to indicate a topic that marks my experience, it is one of ‘reconciliation’."

Hermel Jaworski, France

During the fourth year of Political Science at the University of Rennes in France, Hermel enrolled at the IUS, for a year’s specialization course. We asked him three questions prior his return to his own country.

Thiago Borges, Brasil

"At IUS I experience that a lofty goal of social change can and must be accompanied by a thorough preparation: we need professional formation, a multidimensional knowledge, in order to be able to manage the network of interdependence that characterizes our time."

Vito Trofa, Italy

"Without a real and true school of thought, no significant change in economic, political processes can be sustained… For this reason, I enrolled in the IUS. I earned my specialty degree in Management Engineering and in my field of work there’s an ever greater need of professionals who can make decisions using a multi-dimensional approach to reality, in pursuit of the common good."

Sami Creta, Egypt

A sculptor and scholar of fine arts, he is in his first year of the MA program on Foundations and Perspectives for a Culture of Unity. Sami, 25 years, took part in the “Arab Spring”: just a short while before coming to Italy to study, in January 2011, he went down to the square together with thousands of young people who protested in Alexandria.

" Today, what is opening up in front of me is the fundamental choice of love. A love that is social, that has to be courageous and solid in the public square, to resist even when others do not listen or reject it...”

Cherrylanne Menezes, India

She arrived two months ago from Mumbai, the most populous city on the Indian sub-continent, to pursue the program on Trinitarian Ontology at Sophia.  With a degree in Business and Commerce, she has to her credit some years of professional practical experience in administration and management.  Her first days at the IUS.

Davide Penna, Italy

Genovese, 23 years old, with political commitment experience behind him in his district, once he finished his Master’s degree in philosophy, decided to continue at the IUS.  His passion for the truth and.... love at first sight.

Luc Garnier, France

A seminarian from the diocese of Lyon, he has been attending the IUS from September 2012.  Three questions asked of him to know something of his experience: “Here, I am confronted by other ways of thinking, other ecclesial paths, and other points of view: each day I find myself opening my mind and my heart…”

Marcus  Scheiermann, Switzerland

A young Swiss athlete, a priest, and as of today, a Dr. In Theology at the IUS, tells us about his passion for running, leading up to the 30th marathon of Florence, about his ties between sport, life choices, and academics.

Ivana Simunovic, Croatia, specializing  in Political Studies

"For me, discovering Sophia happened purely by chance, as on the radio I listened to an interview of another student who was telling about her very original experience.  I only needed a few pieces of information in deciding to go.  Once arrived, I felt at home on just my second day there."

“Having finished my first year, I could easily have returned to my previous University program. But in just a moment, my choices cleared: to return home for me was to return to Sophia.”

Gabriel de Almeida, Brazil

Rio de Janeiro, his birth place, is an active, dynamic metropolis in Brazil: it will be the site of the next World Youth Day and the 2014 World Soccer Cup.  And from great Rio, Gabriel has brought to Sophia the vivacity and the impetus towards the future of this carioca population.

Samuel Lopes da Rocha, Brazil

Samuel, from North-East Brazil, is a graduate in Law, currently pursuing a specialization in Economy and Management at Sophia. Last August he was an intern at Mundell & Associates Company at their headquarters in Indiana, U.S.A., a business-member of the international circuit adhering to the Economy of Communion project (EoC) .

"After this experience, I can say that to live in and for an Economy of Communion business means to do something real that changes situations and lives, putting people, starting with those who are next to you, in the first place..."

Maria Hsu Min Hui. Art and fraternity

A young Chinese artist, enrolled in the second year degree program in Culture of Unity, gives an evaluation of the first few months spent at Sophia.

“I owe much to Sophia. The meaning of free gift that I am learning about is something new, while up until now I would consider every relationship mostly as an exchange... I have understood the importance of accepting my limits and those of others, while till yesterday, what I breathed in was an exasperated competition…”