Minister Valditara: «School

The school-work alternation needs to be reviewed: he announced it on Twitter the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara after knowing that it will not be paid compensation to the 18-year-old who died last september during one stage.

The school-work alternation needs to be reviewed: we need to protect them #students and their life.
We are working to prepare fairer and more advanced legislation together with Minister Calderone.

— Giuseppe Valditara (@G_Valditara) January 6, 2023

«Already next week the table on safety at work will meet. In agreement with the Minister of Labor Calderone, we have decided to review the legislation in the direction of a strengthening of health, welfare and insurance protections. We must give our young people greater guarantees than what has been done so far, creating the conditions for alternation to take place in safety. The problem is to ensure the correct functioning of the existing system».

The anger and pain of the parents was exacerbated by the Inail decision which denied compensation. But is the aim only to change the economic and insurance conditions?

“First of all, the boy must be training on occupational safety issues. And he cannot be left alone in his school-work experience».

There are still too many gray areas to be clarified in transversal guidance pathways (pcto): tutors, health surveillance, insurance policies…

«A crucial role is theadequate training of the school tutor called to manage and evaluate, together with the company tutor, the work experience connected to the theoretical part that justifies and supports it. There is a need for continuous accompaniment of the student by the two tutors, constant dialogue between them, close supervision both for security purposes that of the educational, professional, human and cultural efficacy of the alternation experience. The objective is also that of greater coherence between the study program and the pcto so that the latter constitutes a lasting educational heritage».

Do companies have the tools and regulatory knowledge to welcome students into their workplaces? Should they be more involved?

“Of course: administrative procedures need to be simplified and find incentives for companies to expand the number of subjects willing to host students, with high requirements in terms of safety and suitable for offering work environments that are truly places of learning”.

In a country with a 23.2% of NEET and 12.7% of school dropouts, can you do without having paths that bring children closer to the world of work?

«No, the school-work alternation is a fundamental pillar in the training path, especially for those kids who attend technical and professional schools. But not just for them. It is unthinkable to train a good technologist with only a theoretical education. It is no coincidence that it is the prevalent part of professional technical training in Germany and Switzerland, and is also widespread in the United Kingdom and France».

Perhaps we should differentiate the paths based on the type of study and the characteristics of the subjects?

«A 2016 American study by Heckman-Kautz shows that school-work alternation is one of the few educational practices in upper secondary school for which there is important empirical evidence of positive effects on the young person’s acquisition of non-disciplinary skills: ability to solve problems, entrepreneurship, empathy, ability to adapt, creative thinking, time management (the so-called soft skills). Fundamental even for high school students ».

Unions, when it comes to alternation, often speak of exploitation masked students and work in black. What do you think?

«In reality, it is the student who benefits from this experience, which is fundamental for his future. And with the orientation guidelines that I released before Christmas, we started a revolution in the direction of personalizing training courses, concrete enhancement of individual talents, recognition of everyone’s merit, concrete configuration of the figure of class group tutor ».

It looks futuristic, unlike the Cell phone ban in class…

«Those who criticized my circular on the use of cell phones have not read it. We explicitly refer to the importance of the National Digital School Plan and the centrality of digital citizenship. The use of mobile phones for educational purposes is expressly recognised.’