The Seminar “Masters of the Next Generation” promoted by the Jesuit Education Foundation aimed at teachers of religion, the representatives of the pastoral team, global citizenship, communication, and other teachers who are part of the Euro Mediterranean network and from state schools kicked off on Monday 29th August 2022.

The Seminar was coordinated by Father Eraldo Cacchione SJ and Professor Giuliana Martirani, Professor Antonello Famà, Professor Edoardo Prandi, Sr. Rita Ndoci, and Father Alessandro Viano SJ, the new head of the pastoral care of the Institute Leone XIII, Milan and also responsible for the pastoral care of all the other schools in the Province.

After an initial presentation of the activities, Prof. Martirani introduced the religious texts and their contents. She explained what the logo represents: “It is the earth that holds us in her arms”. She specified and emphasized the importance of a change in attitude towards our planet that we have mistreated. The common vision is to accompany the Next Generation which is attentive and at the same time good. To do this it is necessary to discover oneself as a “community of thought”.  Each teacher must bring out the Holy Spirit from their students, transforming the PROFESSORS into MASTERS and the STUDENTS into DISCIPLES.

The meeting was presented as a Kairòs path for teachers, which opened with the questions, “who are we?”, “how do we feel?”.

The seminar was attended by around 50 participants coming from Albania, Italy, and Malta, 3 apparently distant nationalities which reflect the three souls of the Euro Mediterranean Province. All were united by a single focus: to generate a good ‘Next Generation’ of Compassionate, Conscious, Committed, and Competent young people.

During the Holy Mass, the participants were invited to respond simultaneously to the personal offer of the first day: “What is my educational dream?”. A collegial rereading provided important food for thought.

In addition to their experience each teacher brought with them, one or more typical products of their land. A further idea to get to know each other was given by the presentation of one’s talents. From this first moment of encounter emerged the new challenge to which we are obliged to respond and for which we feel responsible: a crisis of religion and a crisis of values. How are we to educate in this changing world? How are we to accompany the children in their inner growth? What role can the teaching of the Catholic Religion and the Ignatian Pedagogy play today? How can it be done in an interdisciplinary way, and by including courses in civic education and education for global citizenship?

During this seminar a new group has been born, united by an “educational pact” (in line with the stimuli of Pope Francis) and by a manifesto – created through the method of collective writing of Don Lorenzo Milani – which will continue to question how to deal with these problems within the educational enterprise in the schools of the network and outside: the group “Masters of the Next Generation”.

Here is a section of the manifesto created through the collective writing method by teachers focusing on Global Citizenship:

We want to integrate Global Citizenship education into the curriculum, starting with kindergarten.

Global Citizenship Education is the new paradigm with which we are all called to deal, directly or indirectly, both inside and outside the school. In a nutshell, the goal of education for global citizenship is the acquisition of the profound awareness that each of us, wherever we live and whatever our role and function in society, is a small but important cog of a single large system of which the environment is also part, and even more so.

Priority can be given, at the beginning of the year, to themes and issues relating to education for global citizenship; a simple method could be to analyze the calendar of global citizenship and already find some topics to be easily included in your program. At the same time, working on a strategy so that these actions are not isolated or unrelated to each other, but are part of a global path, within the curriculum, as an engine of change, for the community and for our planet.

Finally, we should go back to seeing and becoming passionate about those ideas, within our subjects, which are not limited to just notions: they are windows for a better understanding of today, or guides for another possible lifestyle. And build activities from there.

We wish to face the subjects with an awareness of globalization and realize global and multicultural experiences as a priority in the educational curriculum, understanding and respecting the cultures of the world, respecting and valuing diversity, stimulating experiences of encounter with other cultures, other religions, other ways of seeing things, through the creation of interdisciplinary research units within the curriculum, workshop activities and by involving families.

There is probably a need for a new way of teaching with related transformations in school curricula and teacher training. Teachers themselves must learn more about other cultures, and other educational approaches of the world, to integrate specific projects and educational techniques from other countries to help students to relate to others, reflecting on erroneous beliefs and prejudices compared to other cultures and diversity.

Multiculturalism must be experienced; it must become an experience.

“A concrete example can be the encounter between religions: three years ago, I managed to accompany some classes in a mosque in Turin. A young Muslim university student led the visit to the mosque, which from the outside looks like a large garage or warehouse but inside is well-kept, all carpeted with green carpets. At the end of the visit and the lesson on Islam, the community offered the students typical sweets and mint tea prepared by them. The boys were struck by the welcome, the softness of the carpets and the flavours that were new to some.

I think this has been a precious multicultural experience, also lived with the body, which I hope will make sure that when these students think about Islam, Islamic extremism will not come to mind, but the taste of the biscuits and the welcome received. However, I managed to organize this experience, or others like it, only once because the class council has always given priority to other outputs and other projects.

To realize these experiences, it would be necessary to have a shared sensitivity between teachers and that most of them considered it a meaningful experience. However, we have many interesting and educational projects and activities to follow, and it is not objectively possible to give space to everything.”

We wish to commit ourselves to attracting all teachers and staff to train in Global Citizenship by taking up from the UN Agenda 2030 the 17 objectives to be pursued by 2030 to safeguard coexistence and sustainable development through continuous training on issues and problems concerning our world; also promoting awareness of one’s rights and responsibilities as citizens of a constantly evolving world and tracing, starting from one’s own city context, situations of social injustice, gender-based violence and environmental-social-cultural degradation.