There are heterogeneous positions on the characteristics of our school, often not disinterested. There are those who praise it as the best in the world and those who consider it completely inadequate for the needs of today’s times. There is no doubt that not everything is to be thrown away, but also that important changes are needed which I will try to comment on.
1. The Italian school lacks teaching that helps young people, starting from elementary school, to think about their own health. Not all diseases rain from the sky. Many diseases from chronic to cancer are largely preventable. It depends on us, through the application of good lifestyle habits, to improve our health, but this requires the presence of science in school. Our school lacks the idea that science is a source of knowledge, through specific methodologies, which makes it different from the knowledge of other forms of knowledge such as literary, philosophical or artistic knowledge.
If I want to know if a drug is good or bad, if it’s good to exercise, I can’t ask philosophy or literature, I have to ask science. This requires the presence of teachers who today, with exceptions, do not exist, but who must be prepared for this type of activity. This necessary change in our school will in the future have the advantage of decreasing gullibility, improving the health of citizens, reducing absenteeism from avoidable diseases and allowing the sustainability of the National Health Service, as well as a better view of reality for politicians .
2. Our school is a school of the past. Everything that is studied belongs to what has already happened: from history to philosophy, from art to biology. This is good because it allows us to know where we come from, but it is also a limitation because it does not allow us to understand where we are going. We lack perspective because we do not deal with the present and even less with the future. This determines the relative inability of our business and political world to carry out research projects and strategic plans. Furthermore, our documents which concern precisely strategic plans are very long because in our school, for example, compared to the French one, there is little tendency to make summaries, favoring themes instead. Making summaries trains you to understand the important points of what you read or plan.
3. The Italian school is passive, very often especially in universities, subject only to frontal lessons. Young Italians ask few questions and interact little with teachers. It seems paradoxical, but some of the lessons should be done by the students. The huge availability of information should allow you to prepare a lesson with the guidance and help of teachers. It would be an important way to remember and process information, to learn what to retain and what can be forgotten.
Another way to make young people’s behavior more active is the holding of debates on the interpretation of historical events or on problems concerning the future of our society. It is a way to have less harsh and more understanding debates in the future.
These changes require courage because it is about breaking taboos and asking teachers for more training for an activity different from the current routine. The Minister of Education has a great opportunity to be gratefully remembered in the future.
Silvio Garattini is the founder and president of the Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research IRCCS