Italy: The first school of volunteering opens its doors

Italy?s first official training course for volunteers has been launched by Emilia Romagna?s CSV (coordinating centre for voluntary services) with a simple but appropriate name: School of Volunteering. The school aims to promote the development of human, and social, capital, to promote volunteering practices generally and to favour reflection upon the benefits and importance of volunteering practices.

This initiative, which in Italy is the only one of it?s kind, is designed for the leaders of volunteer organisations, third sector organisations and public administration representatives. ?The course guarantees all those who follow it? says Giovanni Bursi, president of the management committee for the Special fund for volunteering, ?a real dialogue with experts in the field and participation to workshops that are specifically designed to analyse and deal with contemporary volunteering themes. The aim is not to teach new, more efficient volunteering techniques, but rather to stimulate a new, dynamic approach to volunteering that is able to better capture it?s intrinsic qualities?.

The first edition of this ?school? took off in December at Rimini, and will be kicking off again on the 1st of February in Parma. The end of the course, in March, will be marked by a debate that will deal with issues specific to the Italian context, such as the reform of the law on volunteering (266) and the role of CSV centres in the representation of volunteering.

Pierluigi Stefani, who coordinates Emilia Romagna?s CSV, highlights that the course is a ?chance to reflect on solidarity, on the ways in which volunteering can bring the third sector and public institutions closer and how it can be a real opportunity for the growth of the third sector?.

The School of Volunteering is supported by CSV and the Special fund for volunteering, as well as by Aiccon, the Italian association for the promotion of non profit culture and cooperation, who is in charge of the more ?scientific? details of the course. The school counts with a range of highly qualified teachers, including Stefano Zamagni, an economist at the University of Bologna, Pierpaolo Donati, a sociologist also at the University of Bologna, and several other professors from Universities in Rome, Venice and Pescara.

The course takes place from Friday to Saturday and will take on an interdisciplinary approach. The classes are free, but students must cover their board and lodgings as well as their travel costs.