The measure introducing a ceiling of 30% of foreign students without sufficient educational background and the ban on wearing burqa and niqab was approved in the Council of Ministers. Schlein: "Shameful. After 4 years of cuts and no serious investment in school buildings, they are inventing a new witch hunt against the little ones." M5s: "Meloni and Valditara have put on paper an unworthy, inapplicable and top-down ideological advert". School leaders: "There are too many variables"
Fines of up to 1,000 euros if you violate the ban on burqas and niqabs at school, a 30% ceiling in classes for students without Italian citizenship and sufficient educational background and obligation for parents who do not know Italian to attend a free Italian course. The rules of the School decree, approved yesterday in the Council of Ministers by the Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, are "common sense" and avoid "ghetto classes", but for the opposition the text is "shameful" and according to school directors the new rules will be difficult to apply.
"A witch hunt on the skin of the little ones"
"It is a shameful decree, which tries to hide behind a new ideological banner the government's inability to provide answers to the concrete problems of public schools. School is open to all, as our Constitution says", said Democratic Party secretary Elly Schlein. "The government's response is to kick foreign children out of class. But who do they think they are kidding? After 4 years of cuts and no serious investment in school buildings, they are inventing a new witch hunt on the little ones, targeting them." And the M5s also attacks: "Meloni and Valditara have put down on paper an unworthy, inapplicable and top-down ideological advert. It is clear that they have no idea how a real school works. What should school principals do? Will they close the doors in the faces of the children of the neighbourhood? Will they rent dedicated school buses to deport redundant students from one part of the city to another? The government places yet another propaganda mess on the shoulders of the principals and the Municipalities, which will have to manage exclusion rankings, logistical chaos and a mountain of appeals to the TAR".
"The real problems of public schools remain unsolved"
For Riccardo Magi, leader of +Europa, "the disgusting school decree which invents the urgent threat of the Islamization of our society, so much so that we have to make a law decree, is a concentration of racism and ignorance, in fact inapplicable, the result of the vulgar propaganda of Meloni in tow of Vannacci, which does not help the secularity of society, but favors school dropout as much as possible". "An unworthy propaganda on the skin of boys and girls", adds Nicola Fratoianni, secretary of the Italian Left, while for Angelo Bonelli, spokesperson for Green Europe, "Giorgia Meloni's electoral propaganda made on the skin of children has begun, while the real problems of the Italian public schools remain totally unresolved".
Futuro Nazionale rejects the decree
Roberto Vannacci, former head of the League's schools, also ends up in the opposition's sights: "The government is too busy chasing Vannacci with a propaganda decree", denounces the dem senator Cecilia D'Elia. Raffaella Paita (IV) and Daniela Ruffino (Action) also agree with her on a legislative decree "of little substance" and "written with an eye to Vannacci". But for Futuro Nazionale, if anything, this is nothing more than a "make-up operation". Rossano Sasso, head of the party's school, rejects it unreservedly: "We had asked for a serious law, not the usual fluff of the fake right, not the usual moderate timidity. The National Future resolution approved in the Chamber shows the way. We are waiting for them at the gate in Parliament".
ANP principals: "Logistical difficulties"
From the world of schools then comes the voice of Antonello Giannelli, president of the ANP principals, who, while saying that he shares the premise of the decree, explains: "The difficulties can be of a logistical nature: in some areas of Italy we have a residential concentration of citizens from many countries, if I have many children they cannot go 5-10 kilometers away and if there is only one school complex it creates a problem".
School Managers: "Propaganda and unrealizable"
The comment by the president of Dirigentiscuola Attilio Fratta is harsher, according to which the decree is "propagandistic and, ultimately, unrealizable". "Leaving aside the fact that measures of this impact are not adopted once the school year has already begun, there are too many variables: as is known, in Italy there are territories and districts in which the percentages of foreigners make it impossible to guarantee the right to study, not to mention that the foreigners themselves are not in comparable school conditions. I am also perplexed by the role assigned to regional school offices and above all territorial areas, called to coordinate school directors to rebalance enrollments and relocate surplus students in proximity schools - continues Fratta - And what if this is not actually possible? Beyond the ideological implications, from which I want to keep a safe distance, I foresee worrying organizational difficulties and notable problems for school managers".
