The Bruno students’ occupation and self-managed workshops
by Nicole Renée Palma, 3A
On Friday 30th November, the students of the Giordano Bruno high school staged a protest against the new spending review. It started out with the occupation of the school premises in the early hours of the day, however, after an agreement with the headmaster, it was transformed into a self-management project that lasted for two days.
Our school representatives Irene Sbroggió, Elisa Favaretto,Tullio Furlani and Alessandro Bonifacio organized two days of self-management and occupation which let the students participate in some seminars in order to raise awareness about the consequences of the “Aprea” bill.
What happened at school on Friday 30th November and Saturday 1st December?
Marco Marangon, 3A, reports…
On Friday 30th November the school was occupied before sunrise. The occupants were supposed to open the school at about 9 a.m. to allow students and staff to enter and start an “Autogestione day”, but because of a misunderstanding between them and the Headmaster, they decided not to leave the school premises before a “democratic vote” (quoting the words of the leader of the group who was occupying).
Only 5 students out of about 280 voted against the initiative, so, all the students who were out were forced to stay out.
At about 10 a.m. the school gates opened because neither the teachers nor the speakers who were invited to take part in the “Autogestione” activities wanted to enter.
In the meantime the police arrived…
After that all the teachers, the Headmaster, and a few students still waiting (also I) entered the school premises.
The occupants called a meeting and explained what had happened.
They acknowledged their mistakes and apologised.
After a long and animated discussion the leaders, together with our newly appointed school representatives, decided to ask the Headmaster if the same activities could be done the next day. The problem was about the logistics: in fact, on Saturday all the students would be back, so there were too many people to put up, compared with the number of students who wanted to take part in the self-managed activities of the previous “Autogestione” Friday. Eventually, the headmaster granted a day of authorized “Assemblee” and at about 1:30 p.m. he and our school representatives signed the official notice.
So on Saturday, 1st December we were on “Autogestione day”. There were some desks at the entrance of the school where we could sign in, choosing 2 workshops: one for the first session and one for the second. The activities were two “cineclubs”: The Wave (“L’Onda”) and The White Rose (“La Rosa Bianca”), followed by debates. Talks about drugs (use and abuse), the Brenta River Organized Crime, and the university crisis were given by specialists, who were the students’ guests. With the help of newspapers some topical issues like life sentence, euthanasia, or current policies were explored.
At 8:30 a.m. the teachers called the roll and at 9 o’clock the activities started.
I attended the workshop on the use and abuse of drugs and the discussion about life sentence.
The protest
By Alberta Carella, 3A
On Friday, November 30 th 2012 my school, Liceo “Giordano Bruno,” was occupied because the students staged a protest against the cuts on the school budget according to the new spending review.
At 9:00 a.m. I went home because I didn’t agree with the occupation, which is illegal.
The following day there was “Autogestione”: activities designed by the students and run by some students.
In this way each student decided which activity he/she wanted to do, for example cineforums, talks, debates and workshops.
From 9:00 till 11:05 a.m. I took part in talks about the use and abuse of drugs where some volunteers spoke about their effects.
From 11:20 a.m. till 13:10 I participated in an interesting talk about the crisis of the university where a professor of the University of Trieste spoke about economic problems. This experience was very instructive and at the same time very pleasant and funny.
Alberto Cesaro, 2A,remarks…
We arrived in the classroom at eight forty because it was difficult to enter the school premises because of the crowd at the main gate. Moreover we had to choose the activities we wanted to do during the morning: me and other classmates chose the lecture about drugs (titled: “Drugs: use and abuse”) and the critical reading of newspapers.
After calling the roll, the teacher let us join our activities. The talk about drugs was disturbed by a buzz due to students who were chatting to each other. It began with the vision of an American animated sitcom short titled “South Park” in which the difficulty of speaking about this phenomenon was exaggerated. The focus was on media and drugs. We compared an advertising spot of an alcoholic drink with the spot of the Ministry of Health (“Ministero della Salute”) against drugs, and we realized that the former was more attractive and caught the attention of the people. We watched two more spots, and actually the attitudes about drugs were very different: the magazine Rolling Stone, for example read:
“Reclaim ethylic coma!”.
During the second part of the morning we did only a little part of the planned activity because it started late and we had to leave earlier than the other classes. However, we started to speak about the problems of the ILVA steel works in Taranto. We chose (divided in groups) this topic from many newspapers that we had received. We spoke all the time about what ILVA company is and its general situation, in particular about the scandal: environmental problems were concealed by the head of the company. After the discussion we went back to class, the teacher called the second roll and let us go home.
In my opinion the activities were more funny and interesting last year, however, I found also this “Autogestione” very useful to know more about the problems of this world ruined by the crisis.
Cineclub: The Wave
by Camilla Simoni, 2A
I joined the cineclub and saw an interesting film The Wave. The story is set in a high school in Berlin: one day the teacher asks his students if it is still possible to start a dictatorial regime and to explore the issue, he performs an experiment based on a new way of teaching.
The students are enthusiastic and in a short time the teacher (who is an anarchist) is able to establish control over the class and even those boys, who in the past had problems, become confident. Later, however, the teacher becomes afraid and decides to break up the group because he has realized that the situation is deteriorating. In fact he has created an “army”. One of the boys who is weak and insecure, can’t accept the new situation and on the day, when the teacher terminates “the Wave”, he takes out a gun and fires into the group wounding one of his class-mates and then he shoots himself. The teacher is held responsible and is arrested.
This film, which fights totalitarianism, demonstrates how important it is to remember the past mistakes in history. It was a very interesting and exciting day.
[foto di Luna Parisi 3A]