Posted on 02 March 2017
The international Erasmus+ project “Living (in) Europe – Europa: ti vedo e ti vivo” launched in September 2016. The project is organised by the Historical Archives of the European Union in collaboration with the Opera of Santa Croce, five Florentine high schools and four European schools from Greece, Spain, France and Romania. For three years the project will regularly bring together professors and students from the five countries involved for international training sessions and discussions on the common values of the history and memory of our continent. The project is the basis for the research of the roots of a common European cultural citizenship, and was born from the desire to stimulate young people to reflect on the origins of the concept of Europe and its main values defined as: secularism, dialogue, peace, freedom, equality, solidarity and democracy.
For the HAEU, the project offers a great opportunity to open their doors to schools and students from the five member countries, making available their rich archival heritage and their team of trainers. The Archives wishes to be able to produce quality educational material on European issues and wants to contribute to the training of students and teachers starting from the original documents that are stored in their vaults. These documents, carefully selected by the staff of the Archives prior to each meeting, are read, analysed and re-elaborated as part of the research on the meaning of the values identified by the project – both in their recent and deeper interpretation – through the testing of innovative teaching techniques.
Over the three years, there will be six international meetings for the coordination of actions; five lab sessions for teachers; five mobility experiences for students; and five multipliers events, that are promotional events for the dissemination of the results, open to schools, institutions, citizens and the region. 168 students from the high schools of the Florentine schools Peano, Compagni-Carducci, Botticelli, Calstelnuovo, and Machiavelli, as well as the four European schools will be directly involved in mobility, and they will travel to discuss with their European colleagues. A summary of the research conducted at the nine schools on the meanings and landmarks of the European Union will complete the work with the production of nine chorematic atlases.