1. Each province should have its own centre of institutional studies to provide its students with an intellectual formation according to the tradition of the Order and of the province. The centre’s faculty or group of professors, constituted according to the province’s Ratio Studiorum Particularis, and under the presidency of the moderator, is responsible for the institutional studies of the brothers even when their studies are pursued outside the centre or outside the province.
2. A centre of institutional studies which provides the entire curriculum required by the Ratio Studiorum Generalis offers the best possible intellectual formation according to the tradition of the Order. Provinces should, whenever possible, establish and strengthen such centres.
3. Where, because the number of students is small or there is a lack of suitable professors, or because of the benefit of collaborating with other institutes for the good of the Church, the centre of studies does not provide a curriculum, and the students with the consent of the Master of the Order frequent other institutes or faculties not belonging to the Order, then the centre of studies should provide some courses and programmes for the students so that they can have a real experience of study within a community of the Order, especially in subjects relating to the doctrinal tradition of the Order.
4. When students are sent to another province for institutional studies, they retain their links with their own centre of institutional studies; they return to it at least for some experience of study within their own province; and they are subject to the faculty of that centre insofar as the planning and coordination of their studies is concerned.
5. When students are sent to centres of higher studies of the Order or other centres of higher studies, they remain under the regent of studies for the planning and coordination of their studies.

Institutional studies are to be made, if at all possible, within the Order, bearing in mind the particular character of our own studies (see nn. 76-83). If it is not deemed opportune for them to be made within the Order, the province, with the consent of the Master of the Order, shall arrange the best way of achieving the formation of the brothers, remaining always faithful to the doctrinal tradition of the Order.

It is for the prior provincial, principally:

1. to decide with his council how best to achieve the formation of the brothers, bearing in mind n. 234;
2. with his council to propose the regent to the Master of the Order, having consulted the commission for the intellectual life, if this needs to be done outside the provincial chapter;
3. to prepare suitable professors for the intellectual formation of the brothers;
4. to appoint brothers to teach in the province’s centres of studies according to the statutes of these centres;
5. to submit the Ratio Studiorum Particularis to the Master of the Order for his approval.

It is for the Master of the Order, principally:

1. to establish centres of institutional studies;
2. to appoint regents of studies;
3. to draw up the Ratio Studiorum Generalis, promulgate and suitably modify it as changing circumstances demand;
4. to approve individual Rationes Studiorum Particulares.

Studies are governed by the following:

1. the Ratio Studiorum Generalis which lays down what is needed for the overall planning of studies and the doctrinal unity of the Order;
2. the particular Rationes Studiorum suited to the needs of specific times and places.

What was said above in numbers 76-83 about the importance of study and its sources should be taken very seriously by the student brothers and put into practice. They must be aware that the study they undertake is an essential part of the life they have, by profession, bound themselves to lead.

Clerical brothers after first profession ordinarily move to the studentate where, normally, they remain until ordination or until the end of institutional studies, continuing and completing their formation.

After three years of simple profession, the formation of co-operator brothers, whether in solemn vows or not, shall continue for at least two years. It shall take place in a suitable convent under the care of the local superior, according to the norms established by the provincial chapter.

I. After their novitiate, the co-operator brothers shall spend three full years in a convent designated for their formation under the care of their own master, who may be a solemnly professed co-operator brother, and who will guide their spiritual and human formation. The regent or some other suitable brother, appointed by the prior provincial with his council, shall be responsible for their intellectual and professional formation.

II. The master of the co-operator brothers may be assisted in fulfilling his role by a solemnly professed co-operator brother.

After first profession, the brothers may be given the ministries of reader and acolyte as a way of forming them gradually and prudently in the apostolate.