Bridging the gap between schools, non formal education and families: an exploratory study in the Milano multicultural suburb of San Siro

Lifelong learning and the idea of a learning society play a key role in our generation’s transition to truly sustainable societies. Within the UNESCO perspective of achieving the Agenda 2030 SDGs 4 and 11, the Learning Cities framework promotes spaces of democratic citizenship that can improve quality learning in communities and families, conceiving the city as an educational context able to foster active participation, policy dialogue and capacity building. The paper presents the results of the first exploratory phase of a RRI research carried out in the San Siro district of Milan, a suburban area of the city that is very multicultural and multi-problematic (what we can call a ghetto), aimed at inspecting if actions of community empowerment and non-formal education interventions (complementary to formal learning) can enhance each other to prevent school drop-out and disadvantages. From a qualitative point of view, this exploratory study investigated the perceptions of many social actors of criticalities and strengths in guaranteeing the right to education for children with learning and social difficulties. In total, 2 focus groups with 50 teachers, 2 focus groups with families, 2 observations in primary school classes and 2 observations in the educational study support centre were conducted.