ad hOCCHI APERTI: beauty as a guide
A new model of education and guidance for making choices to prevent distress and school
dropout, through artistic craftsmanship, beauty and culture
ad hOCCHI APERTI involves one thousand minors (aged 8 to 17) each year, 170 educators and
300 adults as well as businesses, craftspeople and institutions
Como, 18 February 2025 – Experimenting with a new model of education for making choices and guidance for young people aged 8 to 17, through beauty, artistic craftsmanship and culture. This is the objective of ad hOCCHI APERTI, a project selected by Con i Bambini within the framework of the Fund to combat child educational poverty, led by Il Manto scs of the Cometa network.
An educating community – The project involves schools, businesses, families, the third sector, institutions and all those who take part in an educating community capable of combating distress, educational poverty understood as a lack of opportunities, the absence of plans and aspirations for the future in the professional and life paths of pre-adolescents and adolescents, preventing school dropout and unemployment.
The talent to choose well – The project starts by supporting minors in gaining self-knowledge and in developing the ability to face choices; without an adequate guidance pathway, young people often make choices that are misaligned with their interests and are unable to become aware protagonists of their own lives.
Guidance, understood as a process and an attitude and not merely as a decision-making moment (such as choosing a school or a career), becomes an opportunity for support throughout personal, educational and professional growth.
Preventing distress and school dropout means placing young people’s potential at the centre, developing awareness and critical thinking. ad hOCCHI APERTI aims to give young people access to educational, professional and self-discovery pathways that help them understand their talents, addressing the root causes of school dropout such as lack of motivation, the disconnect between school and the world of work, and psychological distress.
Beauty as a guide – Through ad hOCCHI APERTI, craftsmanship, art, culture and beauty become opportunities for learning, discovering talents, building identity and therefore guidance. Cultural and artistic beauty becomes a tool for hands-on and craft experience, an opportunity to discover professions and trades linked to the excellence of Made in Italy and to the production chains that express the local areas of the various project partners, starting with Como, Milan and Vicenza, and then spreading along the east-west axis of Northern Italy, from Turin-Biella to Trieste and Florence.
Schools, craft workshops, businesses, cultural venues, trade associations and municipal spaces become project spaces, demonstrating how guidance must involve the entire local community.
In Como, the project’s central hub, 350 minors experiencing educational poverty will be involved each year in guidance activities, in addition to 500 students per year from 8 partner comprehensive schools in Como who will take part in guidance and experimental activities. The minors will be supported by 170 teachers, tutors and educators in every project activity.
The project includes four actions:
1 (Re)discovering oneself, through the discovery of aptitudes and talents and the strengthening of the skills of parents, educators and teachers so that they can act on the basis of educational consistency.
2 Compasses, which includes actions to promote interdisciplinary and experiential learning in which minors and their aspirations are the starting point for choices. The action involves comprehensive schools in Como and the province through craft workshops, company visits and cultural outings.
3 Artisans of the future, which promotes hands-on experience of artistic beauty and craftsmanship as a vehicle for learning, self-discovery and guidance, through guided educational visits and immersive experiences with masters and craftspeople.
4 Prism, which provides for the exchange of good practices and the development of shared models for the different areas involved in the project.
Fondazione Italia Patria della Bellezza, which promotes beauty as a factor in talent development, created the project logo and coordinated visual identity.
“Continuous wonder and contemplation – open eyes – upon reality have always inspired art and craftsmanship. The beauty that arises from this experience is, through making and the use of the hands, the path to discovering one’s own uniqueness.” Erasmo Figini, founder of Cometa.
“Guidance means first and foremost putting every minor in a position to know themselves so as to make informed and effective choices, both in their studies and in their personal and professional lives. Guidance is a process that requires continuity, consistency and sharing,” comments Julie Pizzuti of Cometa and project manager. “ad hOCCHI APERTI is an ambitious and complex project in which, on the one hand, we put our experience in building educating communities to good use and, on the other, we open ourselves to dialogue with different actors capable of contributing different content, points of view and perspectives on the future, accompanying young people in developing greater awareness of their interests and abilities so that they can make choices that strengthen their identity.”
“Education and training are necessary tools for young people to enter the world of work and develop their own professional identity and satisfaction. And one of the most important forms of skills transmission is intergenerational dialogue and exchange. The sharing by professional craftspeople of their experiences, knowledge and stories makes it possible to
acquire an important heritage of professional knowledge and culture. With the ad hOCCHI APERTI project, Fondazione Amplifon confirms its commitment to creating opportunities
for social inclusion in which older people are an active part of the social, cultural and professional life of a community where young people can cultivate creativity and build their own future,” adds Maria Cristina Ferradini, Managing Director of Fondazione Amplifon.
“The mission of Fondazione Pietro Pittini is to support projects combating educational poverty aimed at young people, in order to enhance their training and career guidance opportunities. Since we pay particular attention to children and young people in vulnerable situations,” observed Marina Pittini, President of Fondazione Pietro Pittini, “we embraced this project from the outset with great enthusiasm and conviction. We are also pleased to have involved Famiglia e salute, a voluntary organisation in our Friuli-Venezia Giulia region that works every day to support less advantaged young people and their families, with extraordinary commitment and care.”
“Dreams and aspirations nourish everyone’s growth from the earliest age. The task of adults and educators is to help young people develop these dreams and to reawaken their desire when life circumstances cloud them and drain them of enthusiasm. Ad hOCCHI APERTI is this: guidance and training, relationships and experimentation, looking to the future. Educational themes dear to Fondazione De Agostini, which once again supports Cometa’s commitment to its tireless educational mission.” Marcella Drago, Secretary General, Fondazione De Agostini.
“Hands, Henri Focillon said, are an instrument for knowing the world as well as transforming it. Fondazione Cologni has always believed in the value of projects such as this, which make it possible to awaken in young people the desire to discover the world through the arts of making. And which help them dream of a more human future, in which their talent becomes a privileged means of expressing themselves and finding their own path. Artistic crafts are an extraordinary antidote to numbness and lack of confidence, because they stimulate knowing how to think as well as knowing how to make; and they teach patience, precision and work well done. Qualities that make it possible to find not only a vocation, but also meaning.” Franco Cologni, President, Fondazione Cologni dei Mestieri d’Arte.
“We are a vocational training centre and have long worked on developing transversal skills to improve guidance and entry into the world of work for young people aged 14-19 who are in vulnerable situations and at risk of dropping out of school. We are pleased to be a partner of ad hOCCHI APERTI because we will contribute to projects that activate the intelligence of the hands, thanks to craft workshops, and to education in beauty through artistic and creative experiences: two ‘tools’ that can accompany young people in guidance and in the transition from school to work,” comments Elena Lepore, Guidance Counsellor, Trainer, Active Labour Policies, Engim Piemonte ETS.