Maturity, Dean Righi (Rome): “the protagonists are the students, not the teachers, roles must be understood”

First day of maturity 2021, the second state exam in the pandemic in which over 540 thousand secondary school students will compete throughout Italy. Critical issues? “It is a question of understanding what the roles are. The protagonists must be the children, not the professors who have to talk to the children, not re-examine them again after the scrutiny done in recent days”. The answer to the Adnkronos is Monica Galloni, the principal of the prestigious Righi Scientific High School in Rome, who in remembering that she is “always on the side of the students” states: “exams are done to give value to children. Candidates should not be questioned but listened to in an interview, certainly not a soliloquy, with teachers who don’t necessarily have to say something “. And the pandemic? “You absolutely take this into account, albeit without exaggerating. We’re not so sure they would have gone the same way.” Covid or non-covid, however, the expectations that do not take into account the starting reality are banned, focusing indiscriminately on the oral: “the calculation of the vote is mathematical. The score is the sum of the credit, with the points of the oral vote attributed on five complex indicators , on the basis of which the candidate must demonstrate that he has acquired the contents, must demonstrate competence “. The principal of Righi gives an example: “Even if the historical contextualization of a literary work is relevant, the knowledge of a date does not necessarily manifest the maturation of an acquired competence: I am on the side of the students, but they cannot reduce everything to me al ‘it was written in ..’. I refuse to think that the students know when each work was written “. Beyond the roles and expectations, once again this year the covid weighs on the state exam:” Never in my life I have seen two years of pandemic – states Galloni – In this maturity, it is absolutely necessary to take this into account, obviously without exaggerating. so sure that in the absence of the covid the boys would have gone the same way – he notes – They suffered: sociality, loneliness. We are all trying to recover the year and a half of delirium. le, but the guys have a lot of resources. And we are trying to help them recover and return to normal “. (By Roberta Lanzara)