115 possibility to become official student of 1 ^ class of the Naval Academy of Livorno for the academic year 2017 / 2018: these are the ones made known in the competition announcement published in the Official Journal 4ª ssn 2 of 10 January 2017 and to which many young people are participating . Young people who see their future in the sea, in line with the new message of the Navy: "Your future is the sea". What the Armed Force actually offers, the educational possibilities and the motivational challenges we wanted to talk about with the commander of the Naval Academy of Livorno, rear-admiral Pierpaolo Ribuffo.
Training as a first step to become official. What are the objectives that the Naval Academy sets for students? What are the principles to be transmitted and the activities to be carried out? What does it mean to become #Professional of the Sea?
The mission of the Naval Academy consists in selecting, educating and educating young students to assimilate the highest moral values and ethical principles to become leaders capable of facing all the challenges of the future, guiding their men by example and with professionalism within the framework of the highest traditions of the Navy.
Within the walls of the Naval Academy, born in the 1881, an extraordinary bond finds authoritative and effective expression. In short, four words: Values, Man, Sea, Future. Future as knowledge, future as education, future as preparation, future as a cultural base and therefore a mix between the various educational and training activities, which represent the starting point for the construction of the future of the official Navy students.
One of the objectives is to offer young students first-rate, solid, adequate and up-to-date university education. Our educational offer is divided into seven different Master's Degree courses, depending on the chosen professional path. The preparation of the students is enriched by various professional activities, among which the sailing practice, the training campaigns on the Amerigo Vespucci and on the other Navy school ships, the exercises on board the ships or in the interactive dashboard simulator, of which the Institute has recently endowed itself.
The picture is completed by educational and military activities, through which the Naval Academy aims to forge the character of future officers, to convey to them the values and principles that underlie their future relationship with the sea. In fact, the characteristic of those who go by sea, of every sailor, must be aimed at the ability to know how to look beyond the horizon, therefore knowing how to go, knowing how to foresee, knowing how to feed the conceptual, intellectual and intellectual aspects, in order to identify what it will be the development of a certain situation, what the future will be in itself.
In the firm conviction that a healthy body is a characteristic that cannot but go hand in hand with that of university and professional preparation, official students practice various sports in the Academy, including swimming, sailing, rowing, horseback riding, martial arts, volleyball, basketball, precision shooting and athletics. In fact, each student is required to be fully committed to the academic path, because in addition to the intellectual dimension, the character, the physical-behavioral and the aptitude must be developed, acquiring with naturalness the value of teamwork and the value of the sense of crew , as a perfect synthesis of individual and collective contributions.
From the outset, students also receive tasks of increasing difficulty, to gradually lead them to face increasingly complex responsibilities, both from the point of view of the tasks and the command of the personnel that will be assigned to them one day, developing the qualities necessary to become Navy Officers and Commanders.
Being official today is not like in the past: new national and international challenges, ever-changing scenarios, increasingly efficient and technological tools, collaborations with the world of associations pose the basis for continuous updating and comparison with reality. How do you fit in? What are the students' answers?
To face and overcome the challenges that await us, it is necessary to have a solid, current and diversified preparation, a mind open to confrontation and trained to operate outside the box, a strong propensity for innovation, not only technological. If one is not adequately prepared, one cannot be authoritative. This is true even more at sea than in other environments.
But the preparation of a future official of Marina must be constantly enriched and updated to keep up to the task, in a constantly evolving national and international scenario. Operating at sea today is very different compared to just twenty years ago, in terms of international law, the balance and sensitivity of foreign policy, the opportunities that technological progress gradually makes available, the cultural level of the crews, today entirely composed of professionals.
The Academy has always set itself the goal of being able to offer a continuous and updated enrichment of its training offer. The students are the first to want it: they are thirsty for knowledge and aware of the responsibilities that await them. They are rightly asking for a serious and adequate educational offer for their future at sea.
Together with the University of Pisa and those of Genoa, Naples and Trieste, we hold seven different Master's Degree courses, tailored to the chosen professional development. Among these: Maritime and naval sciences, for students of the General Staff; Naval, telecommunications or civil and environmental engineering, for students of the Marine Engineers; Medicine and Surgery, for students of the Health Corps; Jurisprudence, for those of the Commissariat and Sciences of the government and of the administration of the sea for the Harbor Offices.
Another aspect that characterizes our formation is the international projection, which the Navy and the Naval Academy have always carried in their DNA. When they embark, our students will find themselves immersed in a reality whose logic transcends the political, economic and cultural boundaries of our country. They will have to deal with profoundly different people of nationality, ethnicity, religion, culture, but all of them united and connected by the sea and the laws and, at times, unwritten customs, which it brings with it. From the very first day, the Academy exhibits its students to this growth experience, hosting over 30 12 members, different nations that share with them every aspect of everyday life: from studies to professional, sporting, military and leisure activities. After completing their studies at the Academy, these Italian students and students, having become official, will meet at sea in the midst of their profession at the service of the national and international community. The Naval Academy also participates in the Erasmus program with many interactions during the summer, with various Naval Academies from around the world. Furthermore, this year we have adopted English as the teaching language of a subject for each year of each of the study courses, with the intention of progressively expanding their use.
# YourFuturoèilMare: why should a young person choose the Navy rather than another Armed Force?
The Naval Academy is not in competition with the equivalent training institutes of the other Armed Forces. Becoming an official of Marina is a very fascinating and particular lifestyle choice, but extremely demanding. It is good that a boy or a girl who is about to do it is very motivated, because this choice will condition his whole life, but he will have the gratification of belonging to an Armed Force in step with the times and that looks to the future.
The synthesis can therefore be "the future is the sea", which does not want to be a mere slogan. Scientists and scholars believe that we have begun to live the so-called blue century and this will have a development of particular relevance at the base of important international strategies. The sea, the oceans, the "global commons", therefore the high seas will represent the key to development, the keystone of what is the future not only of Italy. The European Union also speaks of "blue growth" as a key factor on which to aim for sustainable development in our country. The marine and maritime sectors are in fact fundamental for the global economy: the 90% of trade takes place by sea and, in the last decade, 75% of countries have increased their maritime capacity, investing in merchant fleets, in infrastructure ports, in the enabling functions of the Military Marines.
The sea is vital and the Navies have the primary task of guaranteeing their safety and free use. The sea is a common good of humanity. Each student must be aware that he will become the Navy garrison in Italy and in the world, with his load of responsibility and with the wealth of satisfaction that the profession of Marina officer can give, anywhere at Armed Force level, at joint level, at level inter-agencies, at inter-ministerial and international level. To embark on this profession, one must feel up to the challenge, because it is a challenge that is involved. The desire to succeed and excel must be felt strongly within oneself.
During the oath at the Livorno Academy last December 3, you urged the students to be generous, enthusiastic, curious, critical and proud to have chosen the Navy and to serve the country. What are the characteristics you need to have in order to become an excellent student and an official future?
Also on this occasion I will allow myself a synthesis: professionalism and passion, competence and preparation, enthusiasm, a sense of service and the critical spirit, the constructive one, on which the growth of every official future and the progress of any organization is based.
Of course also the sense of discipline must be characteristic of the student and the future official of Marina. I refer to a conscious discipline, aimed primarily at the relationship with oneself, the knowledge of one's own limits, but at the same time the desire to continually expand them, in a virtuous process of constant improvement. I refer to compliance with the commitments made, first of all with oneself. In other words, it means knowing how to be demanding with oneself, before being with others, developing an ethics of responsibility. This is the imprint of values and attitudes that the Academy has always been called upon to develop in the students or to strengthen in the officers and the most senior visitors who attend it.
Not least, indeed the most intimate and strong characteristic, or the vocation to serve one's country at the service of the community, such as for example the technical and professional skills that the staff of the Marina San Marco Brigade, within the Sabina mission of the General Staff Defense, is making available to the population affected by the recent earthquake shocks and bad weather.
I conclude with "Patria e Onore": the motto that stands out in the historic square of the students, a motto that every student will bring with them for life for the sense of honor, first of all, and love for our wonderful country and the safeguarding of its institutions.
For those wishing to get to know the Livorno Naval Academy up close, an appointment with the Open Day the next 4 February.
Click here for the announcement
