«Today we announce the conclusion of the extraordinary supervisory plan against the diploma mill phenomenon. No tolerance towards those who do not respect the law. We reiterate our constant commitment to guarantee quality standards for all students, whether they attend state or private schools."
Thus the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara announced, after the closure of the supervision plan promoted last November, the revocation of the equal status for 47 schools .
The checks involved 70 private institutions. The minister also "promoted regulatory initiatives aimed at combating even more effectively the irregularities that have emerged from the ongoing inspection actions" . The reference is, among others, «to the obligation of the electronic register, to the limits on the establishment of collateral classes and to the rules for taking exams for multiple school years at the same time. The new measures were approved in the Council of Ministers as part of the Simplifications bill. The bill is soon to be presented to the Chambers and will be approved, in accordance with the provisions of the Pnrr, by the end of this year".
Various irregularities were found , from food and wine institutes without kitchens to teachers without qualifications.
Among the most serious, the ministry reports: « Teaching staff without qualifications or even entrance qualifications for teaching disciplines ; lack of laboratories, of the agricultural company in the agricultural technical path, of kitchens and foodstuffs in the food and wine paths ; insufficient number of classrooms to accommodate all the classes activated and/or insufficient furnishings in relation to the students enrolled; failure to respect the timetables of the disciplines of the study areas and in some cases total elimination of some disciplines".
And again: «Absence of the civic education curriculum; operation of multiple collateral fifth classes with a high rate of students residing outside the region (up to 90%) of whom the domicile near the school is not declared for the purposes of regular school attendance ; differences in the hours of service indicated in the individual employment contracts compared to the work performance resulting from the class assignment documents; serious failure to comply with the provisions in force regarding suitability exams and supplementary exams; ".
