“School 21”: a project to implement active citizenship skills in the Italian higher education. The role of ICT.

Emerging global perspectives, increasingly large and interconnected, require a school able to develop in students not only knowledge but complex attitudes and critical skills which allow to face the problems in a systemic way, to build relationships between phenomena apparently distant and to include personal experiences in a universal context. The current Italian secondary education system is in trouble in addressing the challenges arising from changes in the national and international context, as it focuses on curricula which convey good contents to the students, training professionals specialized and technically competent but not prepared to think critically and to act as aware and responsible citizens. However, at the end of secondary education, the Italian Ministry of Education provides for a certification of the “skills of citizenship” for each student. The project "School 21", proposed since 2009 by Fondazione CARIPLO (Milan, Italy) to the secondary schools and the vocational training centers, aims to improve the Italian secondary degree curricula including in the annual planning an interdisciplinary teaching and training methodology focused on environmental problems; these issues showed to be able to put in communication articulated and apparently isolated elements, phenomena and situations proper of the various fields of knowledge. ICT play a key role in the project: they are considered not only an effective teaching tool in the training of students, but also an “educational place”. In this place the students are facilitated to explore in a systemic and metacognitive way the disciplinary contents emerged and are personally involved in planning and implementing a solution to the problem. In addition, also the assessing process of the skills attained by the students is improved; it is supported by a system of indicators specifically defined by the project Scientific Committee during a preliminary participated research with different subjects (experts, teachers and students). The learning process supported by the project is centered on a detailed learning plan which constitutes the essential nstrument to achieve the objectives of the project; it allows the teacher to link the required citizenship skills with the disciplinary subjects, the educational methods, the teaching aids (ICT) and the expected output from the students; a set of quality criteria, defined during the preliminary participated research, orientate and inspire the teacher in the planning of the training process. The facilities provided by ICT occupy a central role also in the management of the project (contract notice procedures, submission of applications, communication between the various subjects involved, performance evaluation, etc..), in the coordination of the activities by the teachers' board of each involved class and in the various phases of work in schools. The main results achieved in the 2009 testing phase of the project (32 secondary degree classes) and the 2011/2012 implementation phase (36 classes involved) are discussed, highlighting the key role of the ICT.