Widespread Education and school culture: how and why we should support the shift

Abstract

This paper explores how schools, while constantly producing culture through daily practices, risk becoming self-referential and detached from social change if not connected to external agents and institutions. It presents Widespread Education (WE), an approach based on long-term educational projects co-designed with external partners and implemented during curricular hours. These experiences take place in meaningful community settings such as theatres, museums, farms, and workplaces, where students and teachers, together with non-teaching adults, engage in tasks linked to real-life issues. Data collected through focus groups and interviews with teachers and principals, highlight the opportunities this model offers in terms of active, student-centered teaching, increased awareness of the school’s role, and stronger links with territorial resources, together with persistent resistance. I will present a toolbox that tries to overcome resistance to support the strengthening of educational ecosystems and promote school lead WE.