The San Donato school, located on the last downhill stretch of Corso Vittorio Emanuele in Sassari, reflects the changing population of the area. This was clarified in recent days at the Palazzo Ducale commission by the Registry Councilor Patrizia Mercuri, who has also been the school principal since 2011.
" We have two first-grade classes this year, each with 15 students, " she reports. " Three children are Italian, another has a Senegalese father and a Sassari mother, while the others are all of foreign origin ." The change is also tangible in Sassari Vecchia, where a large portion of the city's non-EU citizens live. In 2025, out of 762 births in Sassari, 41 new lives belong to foreign communities, starting with the Senegalese, the largest, followed by Bosnians and Romanians, Nigerians, Bangladeshis, and, to a lesser extent, Chinese.
"They prefer to go to school close to where they live," says Mercuri, who emphasizes: "Where there are foreigners, the Sassari native tends not to enroll." This assumption is also evident in the students who are about to graduate: "In the fifth grade, only 35 percent are Italian. And out of a total of 92 students, distributed across six elementary school classes, foreigners make up 80 percent."
These presences are not easy for teachers to manage. "We need cultural mediators," Mercuri explains, "to facilitate relationships with families, and teachers who teach Italian as a foreign language." The risk is that, without shared vocabulary, aphasia will reign and a marked alienation from the "native" population, which, in San Donato, suffers from notorious crime problems, including drug dealing and brawls, often involving foreigners.
Meanwhile, the progressive redevelopment of the spaces surrounding the school, such as the namesake square, is underway, with €1 million in projects funded by the National Research Council (PNRR). Not far away, the Montessori center on Via Artiglieria, costing just under €5 million, is in sight. The question is whether this new institute will drain students from San Donato or marginalize a school founded way back in 1922. "No, because it's a facility that needs to be cared for and enhanced, a watchful eye on the local area. And we must do what's best for these future Italian citizens. San Donato can't close. It shouldn't."
