Theschool decreehas been approved by the Council of Ministers and has reached the Quirinale (the office of the President of the Republic) for review before promulgation; after that it will have to go through conversion in Parliament. In between there are the school protests and the issue of “funding under review”, which can slow everything down or change some parts. For us students the real question is: what changes in day-to-day classroom life and in school assessment, especially as we head toward exams and the maturità (the Italian secondary school leaving exam)?
Here you won’t find the usual “news-style” summary with a thousand quotes. I’ll try to translate it into concrete things: what could happen in the next few weeks, what might actually reach schools, and how not to get overwhelmed while you’re juggling oral tests, written tests, and exam prep.
Where the school decree stands: from the Council of Ministers to the Quirinale (and then to Parliament)
When you read “the decree is at the Quirinale”, it doesn’t mean “it’s already law and tomorrow everything changes”. The process has multiple levels, and each level can shift timelines and content (even if headlines often pretend otherwise).
In practice:
- Approval by the Council of Ministers: the Government decides the text and “launches” it as a decree-law, i.e., a rule designed to enter into force quickly.
- Review by the Quirinale: the President of the Republic checks that the text is consistent with the Constitution, that there are no obvious issues (including on funding and clarity), and can ask for corrections or clarifications. It’s not “a symbolic step”.
- Promulgation and publication: if it goes forward, it is published and becomes operative according to the planned dates (sometimes immediately, sometimes in stages).
- Conversion in Parliament: within 60 days Parliament must convert the decree into law. This is where the “real” stuff happens for us: amendments, rewrites, cuts, additions. If they don’t convert it, the decree lapses (and whatever happened in the meantime has to be handled with transitional rules).
Student translation: until you see the conversion (and the implementing circulars), a lot of things remain “announced”. So yes, it makes sense to stay informed, but without letting every “breaking news” notification ruin your week.
What the decree provides: key measures and what changes in school life
The most debated measures revolve around class organization, school rules, and the reordering of some tracks. I’ll tell you what that means, with examples you might recognize tomorrow in the hallway.
1)30% cap on non-Italian-speaking students: on paper it looks like a “technical” rule, but in real life it affects how classes are formed. Example: if a school is in a neighborhood with many recently arrived families, the cap can mean shifting enrollments, merging classes, or redistributing students across sections/schools. For you as a student it can translate into: classmates changing class in September, classes being reshuffled, and a slightly more unstable atmosphere (not ideal when you’re trying to build a group to study with and do group projects).
2)Ban on covering the face at school (burqa/niqab and similar): here the practical impact depends on your school. In many, nothing will change because it wasn’t a frequent situation. But it opens up a broader issue: how much school should be a place of “same rules for everyone” and how much it should manage cultural differences without turning them into conflict. In real life it also means more classroom debates (civic education, history, philosophy) and more tension in the corridors if the issue gets used to provoke.
3)Italian courses for foreign parents: said like that it sounds like “common sense”, but the question is: who organizes them, when, with which teachers and which money? If it works, it can improve very concrete things: school–family communications, parent-teacher meetings, absence notes, support at home. If it isn’t properly funded, it risks staying just a headline, with schools forced to improvise last-minute solutions.
4)New names/reordering of technical and vocational schools (e.g., “technological lyceums”): here the “branding” (a new name) matters less than what’s behind it: timetables, labs, PCTO (Percorsi per le Competenze Trasversali e per l’Orientamento, school-work-based learning pathways), subjects, and the graduate profile. For a middle-school student who has to choose, or for someone already enrolled and worried about a change midstream, the question is: does the track become more practical and more valuable, or is it just a reorganization? And above all: will schools have real labs, or just more ambitious programs on paper?
The common point: many measures affect school as a “system”. But the system lands on us as small, annoying things: reshuffled classes, projects organized at the last minute, rules changing mid-year, teachers who still don’t know what to say because they’re waiting for official guidance.
Funding “under review”: what it means, why it matters, and what scenarios it opens up
When you read “funding under review” in headlines, it’s not a detail for economists: it’s often the point that decides whether a measure stays, gets scaled back, or is postponed.
Thefinancial coverageis the answer to the simplest question in the world: “Okay, who pays?” If you require courses, hiring, extra hours, transport, or reorganizations, you have to say where the money comes from and whether it’s stable (not a one-year patch).
Why does the Quirinale matter? Because if a rule looks vaguely written or backed by “hypothetical” money, they can ask for clarification or a rewrite. It’s not that the Quirinale “does politics”; it’s more a solidity check: if you promise something and don’t make it doable, then schools get hit in the face by it (and we do too).
Realistic scenarios when funding is “under review”:
- The measure stays but starts later: like “from next school year” instead of immediately.
- The measure stays but with constraints: for example only in certain areas, only with pilot projects, or with limited funds.
- The measure changes form: they write it more generically and then delegate details to implementing decrees (which often arrive late).
- The measure is reduced or removed during conversion, because different numbers and compromises emerge in Parliament.
How to read the news without getting played by headlines: if you see “funding” and “Quirinale”, always ask yourselfwhich part of the decree actually costs moneyand whether those costs are immediate or spread out. And above all: whether the article is talking about an official text or “drafts”. Drafts are like class WhatsApp groups: they make noise, but they aren’t the bell.
Protests and criticism: why students, unions, and local administrations are challenging the decree
School protests don’t all come from the same reason. Under the same word (“protest”) there are different interests and fears: those who live school every day, those who work there, those who have to administer it with budgets and space constraints.
From the students’ side, the most common criticisms (setting acronyms aside) sound like this:
- Fear of a more “punitive” and less inclusive school: some measures are read as political messages more than teaching solutions.
- Fear of organizational chaos: if you change criteria for class composition or tracks without resources, the fallout hits timetables, continuity of teaching, and classroom climate.
- A sense of not being listened to: many decisions come “from above” and then it’s on us to live with them, without real spaces for discussion inside schools.
From the unions’ side, the focus is often on: workloads, training, staffing levels, contracts, and the risk that new rules get dumped on teachers and ATA staff (Administrative, Technical and Auxiliary staff) without tools. From the local administrations’ side (mayors/ANCI, the National Association of Italian Municipalities), the typical concern is logistics: spaces, transport, enrollments, school buildings. If you move students between schools, you’re not moving pieces on a chessboard: you’re moving buses, cafeterias, classrooms, labs.
The question we care about is: can protests change anything? Yes, but not in a “magical” way. Usually they have an impact like this:
- They push amendments during conversion: MPs feel pressure locally and propose corrections.
- They influence implementation: even with the same law, circulars and guidelines can be stricter or more “practical”.
- They open local working tables: in some cities schools and municipalities find stopgap solutions (spaces, after-school programs, courses) so students don’t end up paying the price.
If you take part in a protest, the most useful thing (besides being together) is having clear demands: not just “no to the decree”, but “which article would you change and how?”. That’s where it’s decided whether they take you seriously or file you away as noise.
Does the school decree change the 2027 maturità? Exams, oral tests, and how to prepare (with StudierAI)
The question going around more than any other is: “Okay, but does the maturità change?” Right now, the honest answer is:don’t assume the school decree will rewrite the 2027 maturità from scratchbecause between the Quirinale’s review, conversion, and implementing rules, exam details often come later and can be separate from the “decree” in the strict sense.
What can change, though (even without touching the maturità directly), is the context ofschool assessment: more attention to rules and requirements, more pressure on “standards” and tracks, and in general a climate where each school interprets and applies things with more rigidity or more flexibility. And when school becomes more rigid, the first thing you feel it on is tests and oral exams: timing, make-ups, criteria, rubrics.
So how do you move from here to exams and the maturità without waiting for politics to decide your fate? With a strategy that always works, decree or no decree: make your preparation “anti-chaos”.
Practical checklist for exam prep (oral tests, written tests, maturità):
- Make a map of the subjects that “drag you down”: the ones where it’s not that you don’t study, it’s that you study badly (random review, a thousand pages, zero output).
- Turn studying into trials: every session has to end with something you can “see” (questions, exercises, a 5-minute mini-oral, an essay outline).
- Train on connections: especially for the maturità, the winner isn’t the one who knows “everything”, it’s the one who can connect and explain cleanly (even starting from a gap).
- Set fake deadlines before the real ones: if you wait for “when they publish the final rules”, you’re gifting weeks to procrastination.
If you want to make this checklist easier to follow, you can useStudierAIin a very down-to-earth way: have it create a realistic weekly plan (not “6 hours a day”), then stress-test it with targeted quizzes and review. The thing that really changes exam prep is simulating: if you have to do an oral, train with anoral exam simulation(even just 10 minutes) instead of rereading the same paragraph for the fifth time.
If instead you’re in your final year and you want a more complete guide, go to the page onmaturità preparation. And if you want to try it with no commitment while we wait to understand how the school decree will evolve between the Quirinale and Parliament, you canstart for freeand set up a study plan right away for the next two weeks: it’s the fastest way to take power away from the anxiety of “I don’t know what will change”.
Last thing (it sounds obvious, but it isn’t): if panic starts in class—“oh my God they’re changing the exams”—ask a simple question to the teacher or the class representative:is this a rule already in force or a hypothesis?If it’s a hypothesis, in the meantime you keep building skills that matter anyway: explaining well, doing exercises, writing clearly, getting through an oral exam without freezing. Whatever decree comes, that’s the currency you spend in exams.
