I WISH I WERE

  • Dates
    2015 - Ongoing
  • Author
  • Topics Social Issues, Editorial, Documentary

Every year in Italy the 23% of the population leaves the secondary school with no degree. In 2013 about 110.000 studentes have left the school before the end of the obligatory eight grade and they are out from any other learning process or school.

Teenagers aged between 14 and 17 who don't have the obligatory school degree. They don't want to go to school and they isolate themselves mistrusting everything. For the society they are lost and hopeless, with no chance for the future. In fact they are boys and girls with different origins and stories of phisical or psycological abuses that have broken their self confidence.

Every year in Italy the 23% of the population leaves the secondary school with no degree. In 2013 about 110.000 studentes have left the school before the end of the obligatory eight grade and they are out from any other learning process or school. The consequent expense for the society is very huge, about the 1,5 and 6,8% of the GDP. In Milan and Lodi there are three special classed, the Second Opportunity School of Fondazione Sicomoro, that try to follow this young person in order to make them succeed in reaching their obligatory degree, follow the Don Milani schools teachments.

The NEET people (Not Engaged in Education, Employment or Training) are the most important consequence of this situation, and according to the 2012 data Italy has the 20% of NEET people, a rate that leads the country at the second place in the OCSE. The first one is Mexico.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Michael, 15. In 2014 / 2015 after a shool failure he has become a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district. He has heart desease and he loves to do parkour. He wish he were a photographer.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Gratosoglio district, Milan. From the second half of the 70s it has become a typical dormi district, separeted from the city and with a degradetad social fabric, becaise of drugs and criminality. Now the distrit is facing a turn-over of its inhabitants: the elderly are leaving for families, often foreigners.

© Michela Benaglia - Michele, 15. Althea, 14. In 2015 / 2016 they was a students of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.
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Michele, 15. Althea, 14. In 2015 / 2016 they was a students of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.

© Michela Benaglia - Michele, 15. In 2015 / 2016 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.
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Michele, 15. In 2015 / 2016 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.

© Michela Benaglia - Denis 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.
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Denis 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Gratosoglio district, Milan. The public garden of the Towers is the meeting place for the young people, both in the afternoon and in the morning when thet don’t go to school.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Manuel, 16. He has lived in a occupied home with is family in the Barona district. In 2014 / 2015 Manuel was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district. here he is with his yougest sister, Shakira, who has left the school at the age of 11.

© Michela Benaglia - Salvatore, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.
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Salvatore, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.

© Michela Benaglia - Benito, 14. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.
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Benito, 14. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Naomi, 15. Patricia, 14. In 2014 / 2015 they were students of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district. Patricia wishes she were a chriminologost.

© Michela Benaglia - Andrea, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.
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Andrea, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Gratosoglio district, Milan. The White Towers are council housing skyscrapers, meeting point fot young people of the district.

© Michela Benaglia - Gabriel, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.
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Gabriel, 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Lodi.

© Michela Benaglia - Gratosoglio district, Milan.
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Gratosoglio district, Milan.

© Michela Benaglia - Image from the I WISH I WERE photography project
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Gratosoglio youth. The public garden of the Towers is the meeting place for the young people, both in the afternoon and in the morning when thet don’t go to school.. In thi spictire Kevin was 13. He would have become a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan at the age of 15, in 2016/2017.

© Michela Benaglia - Denis 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.
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Denis 15. In 2014 / 2015 he was a student of the Second Opportunity School in Milan, Barona district.

© Michela Benaglia - Gratosoglio district, Milan.
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Gratosoglio district, Milan.

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