ROME (ITALPRESS) – Sports practice as a means of countering the phenomena of youth discomfort and school dropout, involving boys from difficult and peripheral backgrounds by giving them an opportunity for growth and training. This is the goal of the project “Sport for Legality,” presented at the Multifunctional Hall of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers in Rome. A project promoted by the Undersecretary for Sport and Youth of the Lombardy Region, Federica Picchi, with the support of the Minister for Sport and Youth, Andrea Abodi, and which saw a pilot project started in 2019 in Lombardy in collaboration with the Fiamme Gialle. “We thought to reward, to give confidence to young people who were living situations of social fragility. We, as institutions, have a duty to give them the example, the beauty of commitment, of sacrifice, and we had extraordinary results,” explained Picchi, who, given the positive outcome, decided to also involve other Military Sports Groups and State Bodies to involve even more students.
“This project is a testament to the collaboration between the various levels of institutions, including the military or civilian bodies of the State, which can contribute to the affirmation of the principle that the relationship between sport and legality is an educational fact,” said instead the Minister for Sport and Youth, Andrea Abodi. “What will be organized involving a few dozen young people I consider a seed that can become a field of wheat. Opportunities need to be intensified because opportunities need continuity. We shared with Undersecretary Picchi to bring this project to the table of the State-Regions working group for sports, precisely because then everyone interprets it based on their own sensitivities and needs,” Abodi added. Also present was Undersecretary of State for Defense Isabella Rauti, who explained how “the practice of sports is a language that comes directly, it also involves emotionally. It is an engine of values and a multiplier of positive energies. It is the main factor of social inclusion wherever it is practiced,” while Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of Economy and Finance Lucia Albano spoke of “a beautiful possibility and experimentation that has been successful. It is essential to be constantly attentive not only to the needs of young people but also to their growth and orientation; the social economy has enormous value that cannot be accounted for.”
During the event, Guardia di Finanza General Vincenzo Parrinello read a letter that the young people who participated in the project wrote to Corporal Danilo Cassoni, Lieutenant Giuseppe Scalco, Marshal Andrea Tranquilli, and Selected Constable Costantino Tovo: “At the beginning of this adventure we were curious and fearful because we did not understand how we would spend these days at the Sabaudia Campus. We are not used to following the rules,” but “as the days went by, little by little, with a lot of effort and little desire at first, we managed to be available to your proposals.” At the end of this adventure “we take home a beautiful memory, beautiful experiences, acquaintances of beautiful people who showed us helpfulness, kindness, respect and affection. We felt welcomed and loved with all our faults and little desire to engage in something constructive. To say thank you is too little as what we take home is not an object, a favor, but something that is priceless. It is a wealth that cannot be contained in a package because it is priceless and the container is the heart.”
-photo Parrinello –
(ITALPRESS).
