Study on supporting school innovation across Europe Case study 6 - Italy

The past few years have shown a considerable decrease in the Italian economy, with an increase in the economic gap between Southern territories and the rest of the country. It is known that economic growth is strongly linked with the training of qualified human resources, and that this training starts at an early age: experts have long advocated for the great importance of an early education, starting with kindergartens and nursery schools, and following further to primary and secondary education. OECD data for Italy shows considerable gap in learning between students in the North and Centre of the country and students in the South (Asso et al., 2015, p.73). In the South, and in Sicily in particular, schools face many more obstacles in providing good quality education compared to schools in the North, as evidenced by INVALSI data (Asso et al., 2015 p. 50). Therefore, the focus of this field study is on the Sicilian region Sicilian secondary-school students have the lowest scoring percentage nationwide for INVALSI tests, both in Italian language and Maths. Moreover, there are other indicators of learning pertaining to the functioning and the shape of schools, sourced from ISTAT and INVALSI, which provide further evidence for the gap between the South (Sicily in particular) and the North. For instance, ISTAT shows significantly higher early school leaving rates for the Southern region, compared to the Northern one. Furthermore, the government expenditure on education in Italy (total 4.14% of GDP according to Eurostat (2011) is far lower than the international average. State funds cover about 80% of expenses, including the cost of teachers based on parameters fixed nationwide, while local authorities (Regions, Provinces and Municipalities) cover the costs of canteens, transport and maintenance. Sicily’s local authorities provide the lowest funding to schools across all Italian regions. Furthermore, according to the socio-economic indicators, the Southern region of Italy (incl. Sicily) is much poorer and more disadvantaged. According to Asso et al (2014), it is characterised by a higher crime rate than in the rest of Italy.