Advertisement

Boy with learning issue rejected by Turin school

The Local Italy
The Local Italy - [email protected]
Boy with learning issue rejected by Turin school
Summer school photo: Shutterstock"

An eight-year-old boy was rejected by a church-run summer school in Rivoli, a town in the province of Turin, because workers there “are not equipped” to handle his developmental disability.

Advertisement

The boy has now been forced to spend the summer in a school out of town after the Don Bosco di Rivoli centre, which is run by the Roman Catholic Salesian Congregation of Saint John Bosco, refused to accept him.

"Frankly, I expected a completely different attitude from an organization that has ‘education is a matter of the heart’ as its motto,” his mother, Tiziana, was quoted in La Stampa as saying.

She told the newspaper that a call to the school to check for available places went well until she revealed her son suffered from a mild learning disability that “makes him more childish than his eight years”.

The school was recommended to the 42-year-old, herself a teacher, due to the array of activities provided for the children.

She also wanted to place her son in the same school as his friends.

“Until I mentioned the issue, everything was good,” she said.

Roberto Romano, who manages the summer school in the Rivoli hamlet of Cascine Vica, told La Stampa that although the centre has facilities for disabilities, “our staff are not qualified to deal with disabled children”.

He added that the woman also needs to apply for a place through the council of Rivoli.

“At that point, there would be no problem.”

This is the second instance of a child with disabilities being rejected from a summer school in Italy in recent weeks after a boy from Rome with down’s syndrome was refused a place at a centre due to being “too difficult to manage”. 

READ MORE HERE: Down’s child rejected from summer school

More

Join the conversation in our comments section below. Share your own views and experience and if you have a question or suggestion for our journalists then email us at [email protected].
Please keep comments civil, constructive and on topic – and make sure to read our terms of use before getting involved.

Please log in to leave a comment.

See Also