After the Tokyo Olympics, will Italy be able to relaunch sports in schools?

The Italian sports system focuses too heavily on military groups and government agencies, forgetting institutes, basic sports and teachers: what the Japanese campaign can teach us

The Italian expedition returns triumphantly from Tokyo. It brings out the higher career of Giovanni Malaghi, Cooney’s chief, and begins to give us an idea of ​​how things work in a country where the theory is”The generation of phenomena“ We went to practiceMature sports systemOn the other hand, isn’t it interesting (and beneficial to the state from many points of view) to collect the profits of years of programming work, duly funded and evaluated, from relying every time on the rhetoric of the miracle and the phenomenon? We saw it this year in Japan, winning five Gold medals in athletics who only a few years ago would have considered us supporting representatives destined to wait for some rare event.And even with disappointment with some of the discipline with which we have always held to embody the basket, we go back to the historical record of medals.

However the enthusiasm for the spoils 40 podiums between gold, silver and bronze medals He should not mislead us. For the series: Thank you for everything and see you in Paris (that Paris that would have been Rome). In other words, we should take advantage of it, as Malaji said in part, to get our hands on it structural problems from country He does not believe in school sports So he didn’t invest a penny in it. He believes in it not only in terms of infrastructure but also in terms of education: He does not believe in the role of popular sportsTherefore, in its teachers and in their training, in the role played by the relationship between local sports groups – civilians – and schools.

In fact, the exploitation of the Olympic Games largely depends on Military Sports Sets, the historical Italian peculiarity, which is missing a large part of the virtuous system: the school. In Tokyo, for example, 129 “military athletes” from the four divisions: Army, Navy, Air Force and Carabinieri took part. Must be added to these items the golden flame of police or yellow flames of finance, 48 items that won 11 medals. Vanessa Ferrari? He is a selected corporal in the army. Marcel Jacobs is a policeman, as is Gianmarco Tampere. Antonella Palmisano and Filippo Torto? financiers. And so on. This is an excellent part of our sports system that, however, is not enough to stabilize the movement and bring back another 40 medals to Paris, perhaps more and in more disciplines. But above all to make sure that those medals work from The lifeblood of popular sportsEven outside the gold box of military sports groups, they are often the only channels through which high-ranking or promising athletes have the opportunity to earn a salary and the ability to train with the best teams in structures and positions at height.

What would the Italian sports movement become if added to this enormous historical specificity A real investment in sports at school? It’s hard to imagine, but we will certainly be able to undermine movements like the British and clearly separate the French or German ones. The #Conibambini Education Poverty Observatory, edited by Openpolis and Con i Bambini, shows for example that 13.8% of Italians do not exercise for economic reasons Thus, for many families, physical activity during school hours becomes the only opportunity for their children to exercise. It is unfortunate that schools in Italy generally do not have sports facilities such as gymnasiums, slopes, fields or swimming pools. According to Miur’s data, institutes equipped with at least one sports facility are Less than half 40.8%. The number rises only slightly in the first stage schools. But in general it exceeds 50% only in Friuli Venezia Giulia and Piedmont. In Milan itself, less than one in five schools has a gymnasium. All this without considering that the presence of plants of this type is not only important for school activities but, again, It gives life to the district, reduces school dropout, and strengthens the community network: Gyms are in fact often open for afternoon activities that are affordable for everyone. Thus a movement is created.

It is no coincidence that the National Recovery and Resilience Plan from which we collect the first advance from EU reserves 300 million euros To develop school sports infrastructure. An investment that must result 400 new gyms It will be built within the next five years. It is a good thing of course – even if there is a drop in the bucket, less than 4% of the requirements – But sports culture is not transmitted only from the building: It moves from a new category of teachers, from a modification to the educational curriculum, from assigning great importance to evaluation in physical and kinesthetic education, taking into account the necessary sensitivity of students. it’s at Close relationships between the public and private sectors, that is, between groups and regional sports institutes. Pnrr also points out that physical activity should be practiced in primary schools.Also by supporting school sports teachersWho are these teachers? Because, as the trade associations ask, we do not invest in them Professional teachers How do you predict some bills that have long been stranded in rooms?

We are not the United States and Great Britain, and we will never have the wonderful world of sports that characterizes colleges and high schools and produces generations of top-level athletes, but much more can be done in the years to come. Trying to boost Olympic results Which we fill our mouths with now. Above all, so as not to hide the structural problems that make the difference between phenomena and maturity under the rug of these wonderful forty medals.