Education in Italy and the Development of the Student's Personality: A Complex Interaction between Liberties, Rights, Duties and Onuses

In some measure, though not so evident, the perspective of duty does work in disputes in which the right to an education cannot turn into a claim to change a cultural context or to interfere with it, since the position of pupil and family requires the duty to respect the context in which the solidarity path, which is developed in school, is located; in any case, that position cannot be separated from the relationship with others (including the society in which the educational system is the expression and the result of historical, cultural and social events, that cannot be eliminated with the stroke of a pen). We are referring here to the sensitive issue of the crucifix in class": the "right" to an education as a "container" in which the claim to eliminate the crucifix is filed, which is weak before the variety of cultural values that are brought forth in the case being examined. In conclusion, it can be said that "right" is a much stronger instrument than "duty" when it is necessary to break down barriers and overcome discrimination. Only in a mature society, where the rights of the individual are already vested, is it easier to physiologically turn to the duties; thus, the fact that we continue to think of education in terms of rights is certainly not encouraging. However, even abandoning the paradigm of duties, it may be useful to identify the role played by the various subjects involved in the educational experience (society, public authorities, teachers, families and pupils), in order to define, for instance, who is responsible for transmitting values (even looking beyond the school walls, considering the internet, facebook and television); who takes care of the need to protect the pupil's personality; the extent to which this demand is really respected; and the goals pursued by the educational system. Probably it will be found that education has a "hard core" aimed at developing the personality of the individual to which are ascribed different and historically varying meanings, such as the need to provide tools to contribute to the development of society (education, thus, is configured as a public or common good, rather than exclusively as a private good)", or, again, the urgency to produce european citizens.