Vodafone brings 5G to the University of Palermo

Founded in 1806, the University of Palermo sits on the Italian island of Sicily and is a popular place to study, and now its students and staff will benefit from the power of 5G.

Creating a smart campus

Enabling new features and approaches to education and research, the "5G 4 A Smart Sicilian Academic Campus" project will be the first time a university campus in Italy has had a dedicated 5G network.

The project is funded by the European Union's Connecting Europe Facility – a key EU funding instrument to promote growth, jobs and competitiveness through targeted infrastructure investment at European level – and is supported by the Italian Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy and the Sicilian Region.

The network hopes to cover the University’s entire campus, including its branch in Trapani, the University Hospital and the School of Medicine and Surgery. Its hybrid infrastructure means it will also provide public 5G mobile coverage to our customers and the local community.

With advantages such as 100 times faster data transmission speeds, limited energy consumption and a latency 30 to 50 times lower than what is available today, this technology will mean that staff can fully exploit the potential of 5G when it comes to healthcare and education.

For example, one use case that will be created involves augmented classes.

Medical training of the future

Using an Extended Reality (XR) learning platform, a technology that includes real and virtual environments and human-machine interactions developed by information technology and wearable devices, these classes will create a new immersive, collaborative and fluid learning experience both in person and remotely.

For those not wearing the device or those connecting remotely, a mirroring system projects the experience onto the classroom screen.

This is all possible thanks to the broadband and low latency of 5G technology.

The classes will also improve the ability to memorise by using a learn by doing approach.

Gamification, the new way to learn?

Sicily isn’t the only place in Italy where our technology is helping educators to innovate.

Another project, "DI5CIS – Interactive Teaching in 5G: Synchronous Immersive Content" allows students at three high schools in Italy to carry out chemistry experiments safely.

Using smartphones, students can watch on screen, as if test tubes, reagents and solutions were in their hands by moving, shaking and touching their devices.

Thanks to our 5G network, the lesson works like a video game, in which players can determine the adventure with their actions and decisions. This puts the students in control of the lesson, and only lets them advance once they’ve mastered the key principles.

The project aims to show how mobile content can improve the quality of teaching and enhance educational performance in terms of attention, communication and memorisation.

Encouraging inclusion in schools

Finally, as part of the Italian National Recovery and Resilience Plan “School 4.0”, we’re working hard to promote the inclusion of pupils with disabilities or cognitive disorders such as autism.

Vodafone’s MOSAIC learning platform targets school and nursery children with interactive, customisable and programmable smart objects and teachers have access to an online portal to help them manage and plan lessons.

Through these projects, and others, we want to enable some of the most vulnerable communities living in the areas in which we operate to access quality learning, for a brighter future.

Co-Funded by the European Union