Pandemic, disillusionment and precariousness bring down the enrollments in hotel institutes. The long wave of television broadcasts in which starred chefs give us a glimpse of prestigious roles, generous salaries and a job full of satisfactions seems archived. And the hotel establishments no longer attract eighth graders as they did a few years ago, when the address was full and it was necessary to open new complexes every year. Around 2010, the most populous institute in Italy was just a hotel: the Pietro Piazza institute in Palermo with almost 3,000 students.
The Catering Observatory raised the alarm on the crisis in the sector through the 2022 report, presented a couple of weeks ago. Several causes, often concomitant. The way out of a situation that does not depend only on school is rather tortuous. The numbers speak for themselves. In 2014/15, 64,296 new students enrolled, which in 2021/22 became 34,015: down 47% in just a few years. The data from the Observatory also include those enrolled in courses insured by the regions and non-state schools. And the numbers of state schools alone confirm the trend.
In 2014/2015, first-time students enrolled in state hotel institutes amounted to 47,204, in 2022/2023 an estimated 25,375 enrolled: minus 46%. Before the pandemic, in 2019/2020, those who chose hotel management schools after middle school were 29,400, about 6,000 more than after Covid. The drop due to Covid is therefore approximately 20%. The rest is to be found elsewhere. Today, the Piazza di Palermo has 2,300 students. The principal, Vito Pecoraroput forward some hypotheses. “We too have had enrollments plummeting. But I don’t agree – he argues – that the fault lies with the halter contracts: we make sure that the companies that ask us for personnel for Pcto or apprenticeships respect the contracts. Here, the birth rate and a strong emigration have a great influence. Then there is the issue of regional professional training which, having more resources available, attracts students with free uniforms, tablets and more. Things that we cannot guarantee and in addition we need to buy textbooks”.
IS after school that situation changes. Tommaso Attura, 19 years old, he graduated from the Vincenzo Gioberti in the capital last summer and has been working since he was in his fourth year. Today he is in force at a city restaurant. But, despite his passion, his life as a worker has not been easy. “I decided right from middle school – he says – to enroll in hotel management. I was very determined. Today I work in the kitchen and, thanks to chef Franco Aurelio who believed in me, I specialize in main courses”. But he admits all the difficulties associated with his chosen job. “Working in this sector is very heavy. I started in other restaurants that paid me 7/800 euros a month for 9 hours of work a day. And it didn’t last long. Today I earn more and I am satisfied. A twenty-year-old boy cannot expect, without a lot of experience, to earn 2,000 euros a month”.
Luigi Valentini he is the head of Renaia, the national network of hotel institutes. “During the pandemic, the hotel and food and wine sector was one of the most penalized”. But for Valentini there are deeper and more complex reasons behind the crisis. “To work you need adequate training: you cannot expect professional institutes to provide waiters or assistant cooks. We deal with the training of people not professionals. To reverse the trend, we need to better understand the needs of the territory, but the other actors, local authorities, the Ministry of Education and entrepreneurs must also contribute”. And he admits: “Even the salaries are often not adequate. There is a jungle and in some cases a kind of exploitation”. Tourism is the most important sector for the national economy and, he suggests, “greater cooperation between all the main players in the sector and more substantial investments”. Otherwise, there is no way out.