Headline November 11, 2018/ '' ' { ITALIAN'S } STUDENTS HEARTSTRINGS ' ''

'' ' { ITALIAN'S } STUDENTS 

HEARTSTRINGS ' ''

AT THE BEGINNING OF THE SCHOOL YEAR ,.............   as most of the elementary students chatted over warm plates of pasta in the cafeteria, about a dozen immigrant children-

Unwrapped sandwiches around three tables in a spare classroom with slanted purple blinds, drab office furniture and a form reading, ''Students who bring lunch from home.''

'' I wanted to go back to the cafeteria,'' said Khadija Gomaa, a 10 year old Egyptian girl.

Khadija and the others did not belong to a breakfast club of poorly behaved students. They were segregated from the rest of the pupils at the Archinti school in Lodi, Italy, because they had lost their daily lunch subsidy.

And that was because they failed to meet a new, and critics say punitive, requirement, introduced by the town's mayor, a member of the anti-immigrant League party, which is part of Italy's governing coalition.

In addition to the usual documentation needed for lunch and bus subsidies, the town now requires foreigners to prove that they do not possess property, bank accounts or other revenue streams in their countries of origin.

Without that proof, children cannot get subsidized lunches and instead have to pay 5 euros, or $5.70 a day, which many parents say they cannot afford. But in Lodi's schools, as in much of Italy, children cannot bring outside food into the cafeteria.

That mean students who hadn't paid or received subsidies had to go home for lunch. To avoid burdening parents, the school's principal allowed the children to bring sandwiches from home and eat them in a separate room.

Reports of segregation in Lodi - and the violation of scared Italian ritual of lunching together - struck an Italian heartstring.

After a national outcry, Italians raised over $90,000 to pay for the lunches and school buses of about  200 immigrants children many of them born and raised in Italy, through December.

And many hailed the effort as a first sign of resistance of the League, and to Matteo Salvini, its national leader and Italy's powerful vice premier, which has cracked down on immigration, hardened opposition to birthright citizenship and spoken harshly about migrants.

But here in Lodi, a town in the fertile Po River Valley with a handsome piazza paved with cobbled gray river stones and adorned with a medieval cathedral and neo-Classical facades, many locals took another view.

On Tuesday morning as the committee that had raised money for the children held a rally in a small piazza directly under mayor's offices, Adriana Bonvicini, 60, brought gladiolli in the piazza's flower shop.

''They are exploiting their children and people's feelings to get what they want,'' she said, gesturing at the square, filled with women in hijabs and flowing African dresses.

''They are trying to cast us as heartless,'' she continued. ''They are the cruel ones. It's a question of justice. They all have five kids each and want a free ride. Remember what Erdogan said.''
 
This was a reference to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, who has urged Turkish people  living in Europe to ''have not just three but five children.''

She quoted him loosely : ''We will take over Europe through our women's bellies.''

The women around Ms. Bonvicini agreed.

They argued that it wasn't so hard for foreigners to get proof from their embassies and that foreigners took advantage of town's largess and then complained about it.

The Honor and Serving of the latest Operational Research on Students & World affairs continues. The World Students Society thanks author and researcher Jason Horowitz : Italy Dispatch.

With respectful dedication to the Leaders, Grandparents, Parents, Students, Professors and Teachers of Italy, and then the world. See Ya all prepare and ''register'' on : wssciw.blogspot.com and Twitter-!E-WOW! - the Ecosystem 2011:


''' Tough Tunes '''

Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless