← Back to the rankingIstituto di Istruzione Superiore Alessandro Volta
Pavia, Italy · est. 1967 · State
Illustration · Pavia
The Istituto di Istruzione Superiore Alessandro Volta is a state upper secondary school in Pavia. Its history begins with an agricultural technical institute in 1861; the Volta became an independent institute for surveyors in 1967 and, with the opening of the province's first art liceo in 2002, an Istituto di Istruzione Superiore. Today it runs a technical institute in Costruzioni, Ambiente e Territorio (formerly the geometri course), an art liceo with arti figurative, design, architettura e ambiente and scenografia tracks, evening courses for adults, a hospital school and classes in the Pavia prison. About 1300 students attend. Lessons are taught in Italian. Since 2024-2025 the technical institute has had a Cambridge CAT international section: modules of the Cambridge IGCSE Mathematics and Environmental Management syllabuses are built into Italian subjects and co-taught with a native English speaker, without extra hours. The school is an ICDL and AutoCAD test centre and a long-standing civil protection partner.
Key facts
Programmes
Cambridge · IGCSE · National programme
Languages of instruction
Italian, English
About the fees The school is a state school and tuition is free. The school does not mention on its pages any extra charge for the Cambridge section or IGCSE exams or a voluntary school contribution.
Admissions Grade 1 enrolment follows the state online procedure on the UNICA platform in January-February; at enrolment families choose the standard CAT course or the CAT Cambridge section, while art liceo students choose their track after two common years. If the Cambridge section is oversubscribed, the school ranks applicants by criteria set by the school council. Open days help families choose. Students without Italian citizenship attend the school, in a share typical for such schools; the school has a strong tradition of inclusion.
Stages and year groups Grades 1-5 scuola secondaria di secondo grado. Five-year upper secondary school on the Italian curriculum with the esame di Stato. Technical institute in Costruzioni, Ambiente e Territorio (standard course and the Sezione internazionale Cambridge C.A.T.). Art liceo: two common years, then the arti figurative, design, architettura e ambiente and scenografia tracks. Evening courses for adults in CAT and Amministrazione, Finanza e Marketing, a hospital school and classes in the Torre del Gallo prison. Cambridge IGCSE in the CAT section since 2024-2025: Mathematics - as modules in mathematics, applied sciences, technical drawing and physics in grades 1-4; Environmental Management - as modules in design, history, civic education and chemistry in grades 1-3; hours are the same as in the standard course, lessons are co-taught by the teacher and a native English speaker; there is also Cambridge FCE preparation.
Accreditations and programmes verified against official registries
Cambridge · IGCSE · authorised programmeThe Cambridge register names the school as its centre; it teaches Cambridge IGCSE. The Cambridge international section of the construction and surveying technical institute builds IGCSE Mathematics and Environmental Management modules into Italian subjects, co-taught with a native speaker.
school is in an official registryconfirmed by a school document, by membership or by taking part in a networkclaimed by the school, no confirmation, not counted in the scoreGuide to all organisations → What stands behind each entry
CambridgeCambridge International Education
Part of the University of Cambridge. It allows a school to teach the Cambridge programmes and to enter pupils for the exams. There are four stages and they are authorised separately: primary, lower secondary, IGCSE and A Level. If the stages are known they are named in the line below; if that line is missing, the school does not publish them, and the Cambridge registry does not show stages either - it gives only the name of the centre, the country and whether private candidates are accepted. Cambridge calls what it does registration rather than accreditation, and the network holds about ten thousand schools.
What the badge means for this school. The school is allowed to run this programme and to award its certificate. This is a confirmation of the programme, not a judgement on the school as a whole. The entry stands in the organisation's public register - anyone can check it. At this school: IGCSE (ages 14-16). IGCSE means exams at around Year 10 or 11, the British counterpart of a lower secondary leaving certificate.
Register to check for yourself, and the full guide →National programme
The state school programme of the country the school stands in: it is set by that country's ministry of education, which also licenses the school and awards the leaving certificate. That certificate is used for entry to local universities, and abroad it is matched to the local one.
What this means for this school. This entry does not count towards the score, and that is deliberate. Every lawful school in a country works to the national programme, so on its own it tells one school apart from no other - unlike the French, German or Russian programmes, which are carried abroad and confirmed by the register of their organisation. We show it because a parent needs to know what programme their child is taught and what certificate the child will get. Counting it would lift the whole ranking at once and still tell nobody apart.
Exams and destinations from the school's official website
The school publishes nothing about where its leavers go: no share going on to university, no exam results, no list of universities.
Facilities from the school's official website
·Swimming poolnot stated on the website
✓Sports hall
✓Laboratories
✓Theatre or assembly hall
✓Library
·Cateringnot stated on the website
·School transportnot stated on the website
·Boardingnot stated on the website
Also on site: Sports ground or field · Art studio
Clubs and activities: C.P.P.C. - Civil Protection Promotion Centre · ICDL and AutoCAD · Cambridge FCE · National CAT Competition (surveying)
Teaching staff from the school's official website
·Teachers listed by namenot published
·Teacher qualificationsnot stated
·Number of teachersthe school does not say
·Students per teacher or class sizenot stated
The school says many of its teachers are permanent staff with long service; some work professionally in construction and the arts and hold language, IT and professional certificates; some teachers are licensed drone pilots. In the Cambridge section a native English speaker works alongside subject teachers all year. The website does not give staff numbers.
Safety and wellbeing from the school's official website
·CCTVnot stated on the website
·Security staffnot stated on the website
·Access controlnot stated on the website
·Nurse or medical roomnot stated on the website
✓Counsellor
·Child protection policynot stated on the website
·Staff trainingnot stated on the website
✓Anti-bullying policy
A counselling service is available for students, teachers and parents, along with the Il Faro project against early school leaving and coordinators for inclusion and special needs; the website has a section on bullying and cyberbullying and a procedure for giving medicines at school.
Reviews
No reviews yet. The community rating counts towards the score once a school has five verified reviews - until then we do not show a zero, so as not to mislead.
Criteria breakdown criterion weight in brackets
Academics and programmes (16%)72 Community rating (16%)no dataparent reviews are needed: the criterion switches on at the fifth verified one Exams and destinations (12%) scored on disclosed data55 Safety and wellbeing (12%) scored on disclosed data65 Accreditation and verifiability (10%)85 Teaching staff (10%) scored on disclosed data55 Facilities (10%) scored on disclosed data75 Clubs and activities (8%) scored on disclosed data70 "Scored on disclosed data" stands where we count only what the school has written about itself on its own site: exams and destinations, safety and wellbeing, teaching staff, facilities, clubs and activities. A low score here means the school does not write about this, not that the school does not have it: a school with good security and a sparse site will score low. A school can fill in its profile, and the score will be counted again.
The score is counted from 8 of the 9 criteria.Only those with checkable data count: programmes and accreditations from official registers, the fee from a published price list. Where it says "scored on the median", the school has no data and the middle of the list is put in its place, so that a gap gives no advantage. Admissions, teaching staff and reviews come in as their data arrives.
The full methodology → Similar schools in the country