School decree signed by the Quirinale; fund for Ministry of Education staff scrapped

After six days of further fine-tuning, the Quirinale’s signature has been affixed to school decree approved by the Council of Ministers on Thursday 24 September. The decree, comprising 15 articles, published in today’s Official Gazette and coming into force on Thursday 1 October, now goes to the Senate to be passed into law.

Compared with the draft submitted to the Council of Ministers, a small fund for MIM employees has been omitted following observations by the State General Accounting Office. There are, however, no significant changes to the ‘core’ measures that had led to various preliminary discussions between MIM’s technical staff, Palazzo Chigi and Colle.

To begin with, a 30 per cent cap on pupils from abroad – who were not born in Italia and have little familiarity with Italian – will be introduced by law from the 2027/28 academic year. The exemptions reported in recent days have also been confirmed: primary school pupils who have attended two years of nursery school will be exempt, as will those in lower and upper secondary school who have completed three years of nursery school and successfully progressed to the next year. The cap will apply from the 2026/27 academic year onwards for any new pupils joining existing classes, but only where possible.

To deal with any budget overruns, a further 3.4 million will be allocated in 2027 and 14.1 in 2028, which will be used to organise Italian language enhancement courses. Finally, the ban on entering schools with one’s face covered (by a burqa, niqab, helmet, etc.) has also been confirmed, as have Italian language courses at CPIA centres for parents of pupils with serious gaps in their Italian language skills. In both cases, offenders face a fine of between 200 and 1,000 euros.