«Stor not key learning experiences, we will support their return to full use.” Thus the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara declared on Twitter the allocation of 50 million euros for educational trips. Money that should allow schools, within their autonomy, the involving as many students as possible. It is the first time that resources have been allocated for this purpose and will be allocated with particular attention to children from less well-off families.
Educational trips, 1 out of 4 does not leave for economic reasons
The question of the difficulty of many studsinstitutions to participate in educational trips, especially those with overnight stay away from home, is reported by Skuola.net. According to the portal’s observatory on school tripswhich interviewed 3,500 middle and high school students, in almost 1 out of 4 cases, behind the impossibility of participating for many there are economic issues.
ANDexplicit (15% point out that the trip would have cost too much) or implicit (7% say that not enough participants have been reached).
A higher share even than those who were stopped for disciplinary reasons (17%).
Added to these impediments the refusal of the professors to take responsibility to accompany dozens of teenagers who at any moment can become loose cannons. It is the basis of an abundant third (34%) of the cases of renunciation of the educational trip.
The school day trip, or not even that
To date, only 18% of the students interviewed say they have already taken the field trip. To which must be added a 30% who have planned it in any case for the next two months. For a substantial share (17%) the hopes of leaving are instead reduced to a flicker. While almost a third (28%) the school has already communicated that this year there will be no school trip with at least one night spent away from home. Without to forget those who will not go due to personal or family choice: they are almost 1 in 10. Furthermore, there are also those who will not even be able to console themselves with a day’s visit, from morning to evening. Over a quarter (28%) have already budgeted that they won’t do that either.
And when you leave, you travel as little as possible. In fact, there is a sort of escape from foreign destinations, certainly more expensive: as many as 3 out of 4 students will remain within national borders.
School trips are part of the training experiences: everyone must be able to leave
The minister’s action was therefore decided to encourage the resumption of school trips, tackling the problem of generalized price increases. The defense of the right to study, said the minister, “assumes the participation of every young person, without prejudice to their social condition, in all the educational experiences offered by the school. These include educational trips and educational visits, important opportunities for learning and human and civic growth. This is why we will concretely support the return to their full use, in respect of school autonomy, also to achieve a complete recovery of the sociality of children after the limitations imposed by the pandemic”.
The strengthening of the Erasmus programme
Another new element just announced is the enhancement of the Erasmus programme and exchanges and training experiences abroad for students, teachers and school staff. There are 150 million of the Pnrr allocated for 3 years, thus doubling the current annual resources foreseen for Erasmus.
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