June 5: final event for three-year programme Smart & Heart Rome
Seven labs for seven hub gyms: the Innovation Gym in via del Quadraro 102, home of the Fondazione Mondo Digitale, opens up to citizens with experiential digital activities and exhibitions animated by students and teachers, with the support of researchers and mentors from universities . A day dedicated to sustainability to share the experiences of the three-year Smart & Heart Rome program, promoted by the Fondazione Mondo Digitale with the support of the Digital Transformation Department of the City of Rome.
Recently, Rome has been reconfirmed as the Capital of inequality. Conditions of economic stress are especially marked in the suburbs and in Municipalities V, VI, VII, with the youngest population in the city and an average income that does not even reach €25,000. The city ranges from neighbourhoods such as that of Municipality II which boasts the highest declared average income (€41,000) to areas such as Municipality VI with the lowest income (€17,000, 33.6% below the Roman average)[Caritas, “Le città parallele”].
Inequalities that are reflected in educational poverty. The three-year Smart & Heart Rome programme was developed to contrast this phenomenon. It has been promoted by the Fondazione Mondo Digitale with the support of the Digital Transformation Department of the City of Rome and is based on Innovation Gyms as a driving force for the digital and inclusive transformation of cities. These innovation centres are created in problematic city areas to network the innovative and transformative forces of the communities, starting from the schools. Strengths include training, collaboration, inclusion, participation, and co-planning, without neglecting the involvement of the educational community and citizens of all ages. An example is that of the over-65s who, with the intergenerational learning model, have improved their digital skills thanks to the students. The experiences gained in recent years, ranging from environmental sustainability courses to measure air pollution to wearable technology with digital, sustainable, and low-cost fashion items, are the result of the activities carried out in the Innovation Gyms (7 hub and 4 satellite gyms) in the neighbourhoods of Tor Bella Monaca, Ostia, Casal Monastero, Tufello, Tor Pignattara, Corviale, and Primavalle-Santa Maria della Pietà. In three years, ca. 60,000 citizens of all ages have been involved in physical and virtual laboratory activities on digital skills.
On June 5, the Innovation Gym on via del Quadraro will present a choral story of the initiative with the entire community involved (schools, universities, institutions, and civil society). There will be labs and exhibitions in which students will talk about and present the prototypes they created: from the flight field for drones in the Edoardo Amaldi high school in Rome (Tor Bella Monaca) together with researchers from the Engineering Department of Tor Vergata University, to technology for monitoring the psychophysical well-being by the Giorgi-Woolf School with the Campus Bio-Medico University of Rome. The Enzo Rossi Art School new technology to create ethical and intelligent clothes and accessories in collaboration with the master's degree in Fashion Studies at the Sapienza University of Rome (other experiences to follow).
The event will end with the school awards ceremony and the screening of the docu-video “Smart & Heart Rome. The Challenge of Equality between Centre and Periphery" produced by video maker Francesco Faralli.
