I.I.S.S. Ettore Majorana is a vocational school specialised in two different fields: IPSSAR (Vocational School for Gastronomy and Hotel Management), IPSIA (Vocational School for Audiovisual, Photographic and Optical Services). Our school is located in a disadvantaged area and as a consequence, it gathers a high percentage of students (around 60%) coming from deprived socio-cultural backgrounds. There are 100 teachers and 719 students. The school implements teaching programs in the area of key competences contained in the technical document published by the Department of Education and offers new educational paths, preparing young people for work. So, our Institution experiences new teaching approaches mainly based on laboratories to motivate students, especially those at risk of dropout (640 students with low income, 90 with special needs, 64 learners living with one parent or in an orphenage), and to facilitate the inclusion of foreign students. It has recently been furbished with new professional and ICTs laboratories and with new technological devises: laptops, tablet, smart board. Our teachers use the G-suite platform to perform online collaborative activities. Majorana has also a restaurant hall and a series of well-equipped kitchens used to simulate real working situations during the training lessons. We are applying to Erasmus plus Programme because it is a big opportunity to share experience with our European partners, to give our students the opportunity to travel, open their minds, improve their linguistic and digital skills, and try to motivate them to fight early school leaving.
