We breed peace

One of the phrases I often hear from Ernesto Olivero is: «Having a beautiful cathedral is not enough, you have to see who you put in it». We had a space on the second floor of the former saddlery of the old military arsenal that could really be a cathedral in size, but like all things at Sermig, it took a little imagination to see it completed. The desire was to create a space available to children and when you put your head and legs on your dreams it happens that one day you see them come true right under your eyes!

October 2010. The doors of our Nest are opened. With a very demanding name: The Nest of Dialogue that breeds Peace. The desire right from the start was to open an educational service to the children of our neighborhood, a part of Turin colored by many cultures. We wanted to offer a place that was a home, where everyone had the opportunity to enter to be part of a larger family that would take care of the growth of each child.
Together with the Liberitutti cooperative we took the first steps by starting a journey with the awareness that "the road opens up by walking". At the beginning there were four educators, we started with two sections of children from 1 to 3 years old, carried away by the magic of the discovery of getting involved and trying to render a common service, a point of dialogue and continuous relationship. Four educators animated by the desire to start from the little ones to get to support adults and learn to network with the territory by creating a welcoming place that would educate to peace.

October 2020. In these 10 years the Nido has transformed and changed its name. With joy and amazement we were able to open two other services: the Baby Parking and the Kindergarten which have led the Nursery to become a true educational center, the Dialogue Center.
A service for about eighty children from 0 to 6 years with about fifteen educators, educational assistants and various staff. A small village where, today more than ever, everyone's contribution is needed to educate every single child. This makes us happy and commits us even more towards the little ones who are entrusted to us for a very long time, perhaps one of the most precious, of their life.

After ten years, what has changed? What keeps a service alive that even after the pandemic went out of its way to be there? I would like to say that the awareness of the role that our school has has increased. We continue to be a point of reference for children and their parents by trying to tiptoe into their homes and accompany them to discover their way of being parents. We are also trying to cope positively with the difficulties and uncertainties of this time by facing everything with serenity. We learn every day not to be afraid of both our negative and positive emotions. The important thing is to look them in the face, pull them out and be aware that we are not alone in this educational challenge.
One of the greatest joys in recent years has been to see children who entered at eight months and left at six years of age learning to love each other. This is peace! Do not be afraid of differences but turn them into wealth. Be friends with the lawyer's son as well as the prisoner's son. Having really understood that everyone's soul has the same color!

M.'s mother tells us: «The Polo was a studied choice for us and we were not wrong! We would never have thought that it would be not only an excellent school but a point of reference for us and for our children. The team has committed to training in a field not fully known to them to help our eldest son on the autism spectrum.
We are already worried about when he will have to change schools ».

Josè, 5 years old : I liked being all together and doing religion quietly sitting in silence. I liked love of teachers and happiness of friends! I liked playing all together and making skyscrapers with legos; run on the terrace! Little girls were playing Frozen and there was also a work table with tools and other games! Then there was a child, M. who still can't speak but was three, now he's four and has learned to say "towel". We loved him so much and as soon as he arrived at school we gave him lots of kisses and lots of caresses!
At the entrance to the Polo, a sentence from Ernesto: "Our children play together! They no longer differentiate between nations, religions and colors. Their diversity has become wealth. They experience friendship, loving each other without conditions, that peace is possible. They no longer play war, they play peace. New children, hope for a new time ».

To write this article, I asked many children who have already left our school what they remembered . The nice thing is that each of them, in their own way, spoke to me with amazement about "loving each other" and the word "together".
Today adults ask themselves: “What can a child understand? But are we really nurturing this peace? ». Well, if that's what they carry in their hearts once they leave our school, if the word together is a common denominator, if they already know what it means to love each other at this time of their life, then I say yes!


Sara Casagrande
NP October 2020