The volunteer teachers dealt mainly with questioning the students outside the classroom, evaluating their reading and conversation skills. Each of the 160 boys was evaluated once or twice a week during the month of intensive Italian course and this allowed the students to feel constantly followed and accompanied.
Most of the students put a lot of effort during the course because they were eager to learn the language and so to enter the Vocational Training Institute in September. "Here it seems to me that a great passion circulates, a strong drive towards redemption, as if the Salesian Institute represented a dream," said Chiara, one of the volunteer teachers.
"To date," she continues, "I have understood that the vocational training Institute offers a unique and decisive opportunity for the life of the young people of Alessandria. The quality of the courses, the seriousness of the teachers and, above all, the educational style that is transmitted mean that at the end of the three years the student has professional and human skills that are much higher than the average. This will then allow him to have a greater margin of choice regarding his own future."
Not everything was easy, but the path deserved being done. Chiara adds, "I soon realized that sweetness, encouragement and flexibility are to be combined with a good dose of firmness and low marks, all seasoned with a serious face and a decisive tone of voice! ... I feel that this experience is enriching me under many points of view."
The school and the Salesian oratory of Alessandria are attended almost exclusively by Muslim minors. There is no intent of conversion, neither explicit nor implicit. There is the desire and the commitment to offer spaces for meeting and growth, to promote skills, to give dignity.
This spirit animates every activity, forcing Christian volunteers to ask themselves questions, to get angry, to change their minds. It is a spirit that leads to a conversion of the heart; to let go of prejudices, certainties, fears in order to meet the other in a simple and authentic brotherhood.
Source: Don Bosco ICC
