The revision of the timetable of technical institutes, defined by the Ministry of Education, was approved this week. The change falls within the objectives of the Pnrr and has the aim of updating the curricula of these schools so that children are better prepared for the world of work. Consequently, it is presented as a necessary modernization to create a bridge between school and work.

We therefore start from the idea that a technical institute has as its main function that of introducing the student into the market as soon as he finishes his studies. This is partly true, because these schools provide technical preparation, which allows you to immediately carry out the job for which you have learned specific skills and abilities.

Only work is put at the center

At the same time, they are also schools that prepare future engineers, computer scientists, architects, scientists: young people who will then enroll at university, where they will have to (at least, in theory) demonstrate that they also have adequate linguistic skills and basic knowledge of general culture.

However, precisely with a view to putting work at the centre, the timetable has been revisited, and the general education area (subjects such as Italian, history, basic mathematics) is reduced, giving priority to technical disciplines and laboratories. In some areas, only one hour per week is foreseen for geography; in others, there will be one less hour of Italian, that is, three per week.

Why should work and culture be opposites?

There is therefore a contrast between culture and work that should not be contemplated. Why should preparing for the world of work mean being less aware, less capable of decoding texts and subtexts, less master of the language and of the articulation of reasoning? It is not wrong to want to prepare students for joining the company; not everyone has to get a degree, and working straight away allows independence and growth.

However, it is not clear why this should be associated with the reduction of basic materials. The hours of Italian should be the same everywhere, albeit with certain differences in the treatment of contents: linguistic competence must be guaranteed to all citizens, because it is essential to being in the world, work or not. All we do is complain about the serious decline in students’ ability to read a complex text and understand it, as well as to produce one; we always repeat that they have a limited vocabulary available, that they don’t master the syntax, that they don’t understand the nuances.

Lots of talk about functional illiteracy, and then…

How do you plan to resolve this situation if you consider the study of the Italian language expendable? Without that it is not possible to adequately master any other discipline: you will not fully understand what you read, what you are told to do, how questions are asked and tasks assigned to you, and you will not be able to express yourself fully when it is necessary to do so. It’s not a question of not wanting ‘ignorant’ students in the classist sense of the term: it’s fine for one to leave a technician without having studied Dante by heart as is done (or should be done) in a classical high school. It’s not good that you haven’t had the time to study all the textual forms, the rhetorical strategies, the communicative subtleties.

Furthermore, the decree also provides that some teachings will be entrusted to experts from companies. That is, the teacher, specially trained for this job, is joined by a figure who does not have the skills to carry out it in the slightest. This is truly unacceptable, because it implies a new concept of education and therefore a new way of seeing the role of school: no longer a place where the student is educated to be an aware citizen and an adult capable of moving in the world, but a laboratory of preparation for the corporate mentality.

A problematic vision of the preparation that schools must offer

It is clear that whoever goes to work in the company will have to deal with this mentality; but why should he learn it as if it were an essential part of a citizen’s education? It is not: training must be oriented towards the global development of the person, thanks to which they will be able to move within the company and learn its dynamics, as well as carry out other jobs or continue their studies.

Teachers’ concerns in this sense are usually belittled, attributing them to a reluctance to progress and a jealousy of their role. Wouldn’t it be appropriate to take into consideration, instead, their competence in the teaching and educational fields, and take their judgment into account?