Where do African graduates spend their human capital?

This paper presents the results of a survey carried out during 2009 and 2010 through which data was collected on the social destiny of African students who graduated from the University of Padua. The study aimed at detecting, in particular, if and how the social pathways of African graduates differed from those of Italian graduates. The survey shows that foreign students are peculiar both because, as students, they require specific services and because, as graduates, they can use their professionalism in other countries or in different social environments. The “snowball sampling” method was used in order to acquire the contact information of foreign students who had left neither email nor telephone references.