(c) Scientific Lyceum, still higher, taking the place of the abolished “Modern Lyceum” and of the Physico-Mathematical departments of the Technical Institute, and preparing the students for the scientific branches of the University.
(d) Teachers’ Institute, a purely humanistic and philosophical school taking the place of the abolished complementary and normal schools.
(e) Women’s Lyceum, a general culture school, complete in itself.
(f) Classical Lyceum, unchanged in its essential lines, but augmented by the humanistic character of the studies; to it the task of preparing for most university branches has been assigned. To enter the universities, entrance examinations have been instituted. The final examinations of the intermediate schools, of the Classical and the Scientific Lyceum, have been termed Maturity Examinations; all the curricula have been renewed, fitting them for a more modern culture. Latin has been restored in all schools except in the Complementary and Religious Departments of the elementary and intermediate schools.
For all these different types of institutions, one essential rule has been put into practice, that is, every school must be a unit organism, with a set number of classes and students; the candidates may enter through a graduated classification, based on the examinations; those who are not admitted must go to independent schools.
The application of this reform, which overthrew the old interests, the old ideas and especially the utilitarian spirit of the population, aroused an unavoidable spirit of ill-feeling. It was used by the opposition press, especially by the Corriere della Sera, for controversial purposes; but the reform has been put through with energy under my direction and has marked the beginning of a real rebirth of the Italian schools and of the Italian culture.
The reform of the universities has been co-ordinated with the reforms in the primary and intermediate schools. Its purpose is to divide the university students into different organic institutions, without useless overlapping. The rule of state examinations is imposed also for the universities, to which both the students of the state and independent schools can be admitted. The Institute of “Libera Docenza,” authorities independently attached to certain faculties of the universities, has also been reformed, appointment no longer being made by the individual departments but by central committees in Rome.
On the occasion of a visit by the delegations of the Fascist university groups, I had the opportunity of declaring that the Gentile Reform “is the most revolutionary of all the reforms which we have voted on, because it has completely transformed a state of affairs which had lasted since 1859.”
I was the son of a school-mistress; I myself was taught in the elementary and secondary schools. I knew, therefore, the school problem. Because of that, I had wanted to bring it to a concrete conclusion. The Italian school again will take its deserved place in the world. From our university chairs, true scientists and poets will again illuminate Italian thought, while the secondary schools will provide technical and executive elements for our population, and the public schools will create a background of civic education and collective virtue in the masses.
I have willed that, in collaboration with the universities, departments of Fascist economics, of corporative law, and a whole series of fruitful institutes of Fascist culture, should be created. Thus a purely scholastic and academic world is being permeated by Fascism, which is creating a new culture through the fervid and complex activity of real, of theoretical and of spiritual experiences.