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We study how receiving credit from a social bank (Banca Prossima), created in 2008, has affected the economic performance of social enterprises in Italy in the following years. Social enterprises are key providers of welfare services in the country, but due to their legal status as not-for-profit organizations they have difficulty raising capital. Consequently, their growth is often very slow. Credit could replace capital, but not-for-profit organizations are often subject to credit constraints. Moreover, given that they cannot choose the optimal combination of credit and capital, the effect of credit on the economic performance of social enterprises is far from clear. We use a proprietary data set and a difference-in-differences approach to compare social enterprises that received credit from the social bank and those that did not receive it. The results suggest that receivers significantly increase their production, fixed assets, properties, and employment when they have access to new credit. The results are robust to several tests and an alternative identification strategy that combines matching and difference-in-differences methods.

Il contributo analizza l'effetto dell'utilizzo dei social network per migliorare l'apprendimento della letteratura da parte di studenti della scuola superiore

This paper studies the effect of multigrading—mixing children of different ages in the same classroom—on students’ short- versus long-term academic achievement in Italy. We cope with the endogeneity of multigrading (and class size) through an instrumental variable identification strategy based on a law that disciplines class composition. By relying on longitudinal data that follow a cohort of Italian students over their compulsory school career, we show that multigrading has a positive short-term effect on achievements. This effect fades away over time to become negative in the long run if students spend several years in a multigrade class. The analysis of mechanisms points to the fundamental role of teachers and suggests that no negative long-term effect arises when multigrade classes are taught by more experienced and motivated teachers. These results reconcile contrasting findings in the literature based on cross-sectional data and a short-term focus.

This paper focuses on local networks of agents operating to counteract education dropouts. We use the opportunity of data collection organized for monitoring a national project named REACT to investigate how inter-organisational partnerships might counteract education poverty. We describe the structure and features of operational and institutional networks in eight socio-economically deprived neighbourhoods located in four Italian cities. Examining the evolution of networks over time (before and after the intervention), we ask whether the active promotion of networks increases their role and effectiveness. We observe that both operative and institutional networks involved agents from different social domains; an encouraging result that states the need for composite skills and resources to deal with school dropouts. In addition, all entities involved in these networks played similar roles with no hierarchy; therefore, the networks showed a lack of governance leading to weak embeddedness. The REACT project seemed to be successful in enabling networking; in all urban neighbourhoods, the presence of private-sector organizations in networks increased and they became denser. Nonetheless, no cohesion among entities was created, and embeddedness is still lacking. Overall, our results suggest a lack of governance in local networks fighting school dropouts and call for future attention to this area when promoting education communities.

Questo paper illustra gli esiti della valutazione degli effetti di breve periodo del progetto Agente 0030. Ideato e realizzato dall’associazione “Le Compagnie Malviste” durante l’anno scolastico 2022/2023, coinvolgendo classi della scuola primaria “C. Poma” dell’Istituto Comprensivo Statale “L. Manara” di Milano. Il progetto si proponeva di migliorare le conoscenze, le attitudini e i comportamenti degli studenti nel campo della sostenibilità ambientale usando tecniche attive che coinvolgono i bambini e le bambine in prima persona ed aumentano la loro interazione con gli attori del quartiere. Lo studio di valutazione mira a comprendere quali sono gli effetti del progetto realizzato sulle variabili che misurano le conoscenze, le attitudini ed i comportamenti degli alunni nei confronti dell’ambiente. I dati sono stati raccolti attraverso la somministrazione di questionari prima e dopo il progetto, sia ai bambini trattati, sia a un gruppo di controllo composto da bambini appartenenti alla scuola primaria “L. Manara” attiva in un territorio limitrofo. La stima dell’effetto è stata effettuata utilizzando metodi di stima controfattuali non sperimentali. Contrariamente alle attese, le azioni del progetto sembrano aver prodotto nei bambini trattati un peggioramento nelle attitudini e negli atteggiamenti a favore della sostenibilità ambientale, anche se solo alcuni risultati sono statisticamente significativi. Si è invece rilevato un miglioramento nel grado di conoscenza di taluni termini relativi al tema e degli obiettivi dell’Agenda 2030., This paper illustrates the results of the evaluation of the short-term effects of the Agente 0030 project. Conceived and implemented by the "Le Compagnie Malviste" association during the 2022/2023 school year, involving classes of the "C. Poma” of the State Comprehensive Institute “L. Manara” in Milan. The project aimed to improve students' knowledge, attitudes and behaviors in the field of environmental sustainability using active techniques that involve children personally and increase their interaction with neighborhood actors. The evaluation study aims to understand the effects of the project carried out on the variables that measure the knowledge, attitudes and behavior of pupils towards the environment. The data were collected through the administration of questionnaires before and after the project, both to the treated children and to a control group made up of children belonging to the “L. Manara” active in a neighboring area. The effect estimate was carried out using non-experimental counterfactual estimation methods. Contrary to expectations, the project's actions appear to have produced a worsening of attitudes and attitudes in favor of environmental sustainability in the treated children, even if only some results are statistically significant. However, an improvement was noted in the level of knowledge of certain terms relating to the topic and the objectives of the 2030 Agenda.

Multigrading represents the practice of mixing children of different ages in the same classroom. This paper examines the effect of attending a multigrade class in Grade 2 on students' academic achievement in Grades 2, 5, and 8, respectively, considering Italy as a case study. To address the issue of endogeneity of multigrading (and class size), we adopt an IV identification strategy based on a law that disciplines class composition. We show that multigrading has a positive (16 percent of a standard deviation) short-term effect on academic achievements. However, this effect diminishes over time and becomes negative (-10 percent of a standard deviation) if students spend several years in a multigrade class. Mechanism analysis indicates the fundamental role of teachers and suggests that the negative long-term effect of multigrading is not statistically different from zero when multigrade classes are taught by more experienced teachers. These findings, based on longitudinal data, reconcile contrasting results in the literature, which are based on cross-sectional data and on the short-term effects of multigrading.

We analyse the impact of a program aimed at revitalziing internal and neglected areas in Northern Italy

Questo rapporto illustra i risultati della valutazione degli effetti di breve termine del progetto “Primi passi. Polo sperimentale per la prima infan-zia”, finanziato dal bando Prima Infanzia dell’Impresa Sociale Con i Bam-bini e coordinato, in qualità di ente capofila, dal Comune di Milano. È og-getto di valutazione, in particolare, l’azione di progettazione e attuazione della proposta didattico-educativa che include le molteplici attività svolte all’interno delle scuole dell’infanzia comunali. La stima degli effetti di questo specifico intervento, nell’ambito del più am-pio progetto Primi Passi, è stata effettuata utilizzando tecniche controfat-tuali non sperimentali (matching e difference-in-differences), che consento-no di stimare la situazione controfattuale anche senza disporre di un cam-pione di controllo selezionato casualmente, tenendo sotto controllo le di-storsioni che tale contesto può generare. Tali tecniche permettono di comprendere se le attività svolte nelle scuole dell’infanzia siano state in grado di modificare la soddisfazione e il benes-sere dei genitori e del personale educativo nonché le competenze cognitive e non cognitive dei bambini (identificate come variabili risultato), ponendo perciò le basi per l’eventuale scalabilità del modello: la verifica dell’efficacia dell’esperienza attuata nel Municipio 2 del Comune di Milano crea, infatti, i presupposti per ampliare la portata e la qualità dell’intervento, estendendone l’impatto potenziale oltre i confini della spe-rimentazione avviata. Dopo una breve descrizione degli obiettivi e delle azioni progettuali, il do-cumento presenta la stima degli effetti di breve periodo delle attività svolte nelle scuole dell’infanzia sulle variabili risultato sopra elencate, misurate tramite test e questionari appositamente costruiti e somministrati, rispetti-vamente, a bambini, educatori e genitori prima e dopo l’implementazione del progetto.

L’Italia, negli ultimi 30 anni, ha sperimentato una forte crescita della popolazione immigrata, tanto che gli stranieri residenti, passati dai 625.000 del 1991 ai quasi 5,2 milioni del 2021, superano oggi l’8,8% della popolazione nazionale. Agli albori del fenomeno migratorio, la popolazione che entrava in Italia era costituita principalmente da giovani maschi in cerca di occupazione. Molti di loro, una volta sistemati nel paese, sono stati raggiunti dalle loro famiglie o ne hanno creata una nuova in Italia. Ciò ha contribuito, con il passare del tempo, a fare crescere anche il numero di giovani di origine straniera in età scolare che vivono nel nostro paese, sia perché immigrati al seguito delle madri che si ricongiungevano a mariti e compagni (immigrati di prima generazione), sia perché nati in Italia da genitori immigrati (immigrati di seconda generazione). Di conseguenza, l’immigrazione ha avuto un impatto rilevante anche sul sistema scolastico italiano, nel quale gli studenti stranieri sono passati dai 25.000 del 1991 agli oltre 860.000 del 2019. Questi studenti rappresentano oggi circa il 10% della popolazione scolastica complessiva, con una incidenza che varia dall’11,5% nella scuola primaria al 7,4% nella secondaria di secondo grado e che cambia molto tra contesti territoriali (Santagati e Colussi, 2020). anche quando si tenga conto delle caratteristiche personali e dei risultati scolastici, gli studenti stranieri di prima generazione hanno una minore probabilità di scegliere una scuola superiore liceale, che garantisce un più facile accesso all’università, rispetto ai loro colleghi italiani. La differenza rispetto agli italiani si riduce per gli studenti di seconda generazione, ma non si annulla del tutto. Inoltre, questa tendenza sembra più accentuata nel caso delle ragazze straniere, piuttosto che dei maschi. Abbiamo osservato che gli studenti stranieri, a parità di risultati conseguiti nei test Invalsi, ottengono dai loro insegnanti voti più ba

We investigate the educational choices of first- and second-generation immigrant students at the transition between lower-secondary school and high school by exploiting a large longitudinal dataset of about 50,000 students in Italy. We find that immigrant students are less likely to choose challenging academic track high schools compared with their Italian counterparts, after controlling for household characteristics, school fixed effects, and students' performance. We show that systematic differences in teachers' feedback received by the two groups of students are an important driver of the observed differences in educational choices by immigrant and native students. In addition, after controlling for observable characteristics, we find that immigrant students are more likely to be formally advised by their teachers to choose vocational or technical high schools rather than academic tracks, especially in the case of female students, reflecting a discrimination bias that has not previously been emphasized in the literature. This suggests the role for a new dimension of policy intervention aimed at reducing the possibility of teachers' induced discrimination based on implicit stereotypes.

The availability of cheap Wi-Fi internet connections has encouraged schools to adopt Web 2.0 platforms for teaching, with the intention of stimulating students’ academic achievement and participation in school. Moreover, during the recent explosion of the SARS-CoV-2 crisis that forced many countries to close schools (as well as offices and factories), the widespread diffusion of these applications kept school systems going. Despite their widespread use as teaching tools, the effect of adopting Web 2.0 platforms on students’ performance has never been rigorously tested. We fill this gap in the literature by analyzing the impact of using Twitter as a teaching tool on high school students’ literature skills. Based on a large-scale, randomized controlled trial that involved 70 schools and about 1,500 students, we find that using Twitter to teach literature has an overall negative effect on students’ average achievement, reducing standardized test scores by about 25 percent of a standard deviation. The negative effect is stronger on students who usually perform better.

L'articolo discute l'utilizzo di metodologie controfattuali per la valutazione di interventi in campo sociale.

We describe the possible role of private funders in the new welfare mix

We study how multigrading, which is mixing students of different grades into a single class, affects children’s cognitive achievement in primary school. We build instruments to identify the causal effect of multigrading by exploiting an Italian law that controls class size and grade composition. Results suggest that attendance in multigrade versus single-grade classes increases students’ performance on standardized tests by 19 percent of a standard deviation for second graders, and it has zero effect for fifth graders. The positive impact of multigrading for second graders appears to be driven by children sharing their class with peers from higher grades. This last finding rationalizes the absence of a multigrade effect for fifth graders.

This paper deals with the evaluation of the effects social policies

This chapter describes the status and the recent changes of the Italian legislation concerning Civil Society and Nonprofit Organisations

Disegno della valutazione di un progetto che importa le Riunioni di Famiglia nelle scuole