From Gentile to today, the state exam changes its face every decade, but the school that prepares it has remained the same in form and more fragile in substance: less authoritative, more exposed, and prisoner of a collective hypocrisy
For a century, maturity has changed form, but not substance. It was born with the Gentile reform of 1923, which established the “maturity exam” as the final test of high school education and an obligatory step to access university; the test had to certify not only the knowledge, but the “spiritual maturity” of the candidate: the ability to think, judge, argue. Since then, each generation of students has found a different exam: with or without external commissioners, with more or less written papers, with essays, grids, credits and orientation tests. It is a faithful thermometer of our educational and pedagogical fevers: when rigor is desired, the exam becomes harsher; when inclusion is invoked, it softens; when you dream of modernity, you digitize.
The problem lies in the fact that the school that preceded it – the one that trains male and female students day after day – has apparently remained the same: same classrooms, same timetables, same age division, same annual calendar. The body is still, only the examination dress changes. Yet, if the shape of the school container has not changed, the substance has. Today’s school is weaker, less demanding, more lax in its judgments: it is a school that fears conflict, that measures its words so as not to end up in an appeal, that moves under the crossfire of criticism – whether right or wrong – from students, parents, the press and the courts. A school that has lost part of its authority and which, perhaps for this reason, accompanies everyone to – and into – graduation with too light a hand, despite the fact that the term “exam” still resonates in our wings trying to instill fear, with ever less effectiveness, just like a Manzonian shout. It should also be added that maturity, in theory, is still selective and may not promote, but the numbers say otherwise. For years, 99% of candidates pass the exam and the remaining 1% immediately become a media sensation, as if they were a statistical anomaly or bureaucratic cruelty. These very rosy percentages, however, clash with other findings: just look at the Invalsi data, if you want to stop at the data, which every year indicates declining skills, especially in mathematics and reading comprehension, with a growing share of graduates who do not reach the minimum levels. But this is another story, also a burning one, which deserves separate reflection.
The point of the matter is not to fail more, to make selections, to go back to the old days, but to restore coherence to the system. Well, if a reform was really needed, we would need to intervene here: either we accept that the school may not promote – without drama, without trials -, or we openly declare that the exam is only a symbolic rite, an end-of-course ceremony. Today, however, we remain suspended in a strange hypocrisy: a “fair”, “fair”, “inclusive” examination, which however must always add up. All promoted, all mature, all happy, apart from the rare cases that scandalize the country, such as the student who chose to remain silent during the oral exam in protest. Yes, that seems intolerable: not so much the silence, but the suspicion that behind it there is a real question about the maturity of the system itself, so rigid and so fragile at the same time. Maturity always changes, school doesn’t. Or rather: what should change does not change, and everything else is weakened. For a century Italy has been discussing the state exam, but the real exam – that of the school and its educational courage – still remains to be taken.
