Farewell to “Mamma Erasmus”

This newsletter could not close without a tribute to Sofia Corradi, who passed away on 17 October at the age of 91.

Known across Europe as “Mamma Erasmus”, Professor Corradi was the visionary mind behind a simple yet revolutionary idea: making the study-abroad experience a right accessible to all, rather than a privilege for a few.

Her intuition was born from personal experience.

In 1958, Corradi received a Fulbright scholarship and studied at Columbia University in New York. Upon returning to Italy, however, the exams she had taken abroad were not recognised. From that disappointment emerged an idea destined to change the face of European education: imagining a system in which students could move freely between European universities, with full academic recognition.

In 1963, she published Educating for Internationalism, laying the cultural foundations of what would later become a European vision of education.

Then, in 1969, during the Conference of European Rectors in Geneva, she presented a memorandum proposing a “bottom-up” model: mobility as an autonomous choice of universities, not merely an agreement between governments. That same year, Corradi drafted the memorandum of 10 October 1969, introducing the concept of prior recognition of the study plan abroad by faculty councils — the founding core of today’s Erasmus programme.

From there, the path towards the programme we know today unfolded steadily and inevitably.

In 1976, the EU Council of Ministers of Education adopted a resolution encouraging the first Joint Study Programmesamong European universities, transforming an academic vision into a shared political horizon.

In the years that followed, universities began to experiment concretely with student mobility, bilateral agreements and credit recognition, consolidating what was by then a mature model.

Between 1985 and 1986, the European Commission translated this experience into an official proposal: the Erasmus Programme.

And in 1987, with Council Decision 87/327/EEC, Corradi’s vision became reality: the largest university mobility programme ever implemented in Europe was born.

Since then, Erasmus has never stopped evolving, eventually becoming today’s Erasmus+, a programme that embraces not only education, but also training, youth and sport.

A legacy that continues to embody Sofia Corradi’s vision: a Europe where learning means meeting, sharing, and building together.