Education in Italy presents a complex and varied panorama, characterized by a dichotomy between recognized excellence and growing ethical and social concerns.
It tells of the slow inexorable decline of the social elevator. The young people who attend the best universities belong to families with medium or medium-high incomes. And more and more young people, belonging to the weakest strata, are choosing online universities.
The issue, after thirty years of torpor, has become the subject of investigations, editorials and reports, which have placed online universities in the foreground. Degree mills that have been distributing paid degrees for years now, making huge profits with the tacit approval of politicians, have made headlines in the national media.
The question requires us to go back in time, to the end of the 1990s, when three degree courses in Economics and Business and subsequently a degree course in Communications Sciences were introduced in Gela, both decentralized sections respectively of the Faculty of Economics and Business and Letters and Philosophy of the University of Catania.
An experience that lasted approximately nine years and was crowned with success, ending with the end of the two mandates of the Gelese professor. Filippo Collura at the top of the provincial administration of Caltanissetta, the funding body of university courses. After Collura, the local authorities – mayor Rosario Crocetta – let university courses die, opening the way for online universities, which today thrive in Gela and make the Gela community the best equipped in the field of distance learning.
It is not something to boast about, it rather constitutes an epochal transition. The generation of students without financial support or interested in earning the qualification rather than acquiring skills before entering the job market, finds an alternative in online universities, whose main attraction lies in their low cost and less commitment required.
The enrollment of young people, residing in Gela or in the district, in online universities therefore does not only constitute a useful indicator in the field of university education, but the indicator of an economic decline and, even more importantly, of a vertical fall in life plans ambitious or, in any case, tending to occupy a high income bracket. Will and interest disappeared and we preferred to consciously aim for the “degree”.
The quality of distance learning teaching is no mystery to anyone. The advantages are abundantly known, which have nothing to do with cultural background. If the President of the Collura Province deserves to be remembered as a shrewd and far-sighted man, the silent local administrators, who did not take up the gamble of the university centre, are entering the worst page of local history.
Today, the attendance of young people from Gelato in universities of excellence or in public universities (and private ones of great prestige, such as Bocconi and the Cattolica of Milan and some others), appears preparatory to emigration to Northern Italy or abroad, with the resulting depletion of human resources.
The abandonment of the public university experience in the 2000s, therefore, can be ascribed as an event that marks the community of Gela in an indelible way. Not having used the right levers to obtain the permanence of degree courses is not a venial sin of local politics, but one of the worst phenomena of superficiality, sloppiness and indifference of local politics.
Gela’s case is naturally part of a national phenomenon. Telematic universities, especially in the South, represent a significant component of the educational system, with 11 institutions, a number that exceeds other Western countries. These predominantly private and for-profit institutions have seen significant profit revenues and increased enrollment, making up more than 10% of undergraduate students.
A growing phenomenon despite criticism relating to the quality of education and the precariousness of the teaching staff, often made up of workers with annual contracts and in subordinate positions. To judge the quality of education in distance learning, one fact is enough: the student-teacher ratio in telematics has gone from 152.2 in 2012 to 384.8 in 2022, and is approximately thirteen times higher than that of traditional universities, dropped, same time interval, from 30.2 to 28.5
To broaden the picture of decline, in parallel to the issue of online universities, the phenomenon of diploma mills in Sicily has been recorded. Reports and investigations have recently made it known how some private institutions offer diplomas at affordable prices, with offers that go as far as promising the delivery of a high school diploma by recovering four years of studies in less than a year.
These practices, despite being widely known, have not caused the scandal that one would expect, continuing to receive public contributions.
The latest ANVUR dossier relating to the landscape of higher education and research in Italy, published in June 2023, offers a detailed analysis of the state of the country’s university system, highlighting the evolutions of the last ten years. Among the relevant data, two significant trends emerge: the first concerns the geographical disparities between the different areas of the country, while the second focuses on the comparison between traditional and online universities.
The gap between North and South continues to widen, marking a worrying trend over the last decade. The number of university students is increasing in Northern Italy, with an increase of 17.2% in universities in the North-West, while in the South there was a decline of 16.7%.
This trend is also confirmed by the data relating to new registrations, which show an increase of 15.7% in the North-West and a decrease of 2.2% in the South. Despite an increase in the training offer and an improvement in the student-student ratio teachers in the South, the demand for higher education remains significantly low.
At the same time, we observe a reduction in the gap between traditional and online universities. Online universities have recorded exponential growth both in the number of enrolments, with an increase of 410.9%, and in the educational offering, which has grown by 113%. These trends reflect a significant shift in the relationship between students and teachers, although the very nature of online education makes this indicator less critical.
It is interesting to note how the distribution by age group among those enrolled in online universities shows a mirror inversion compared to that of traditional universities. If previously telematics mainly attracted individuals over 31 years of age, they are now seeing an increase in young graduates among their members, suggesting an evolution in their catchment area.
The implications of these dynamics are multiple. Growing geographic polarization could aggravate regional inequalities and hinder development, especially in the South, already afflicted by a worrying demographic reduction.
In conclusion, while online education could simplify access to higher education, it is essential to evaluate its long-term outcomes to ensure that such access does not translate into a form of inclusion that undermines the quality of learning and future prospects of the students.
