(versione italiana qua)
A historic step has been taken for the Italian school system. With the publication in the Official Gazette of January 27, 2026 of the new National Guidelines, informatics officially enters primary and lower secondary schools as a subject of study. This is no longer a matter of basic digital literacy or learning to use a computer – it marks the introduction of computer science as a fully-fledged scientific discipline.
This reform represents a highly significant milestone in a journey that began twenty years ago with the conference Informatics: Culture and Society. Informatics is being integrated into the curriculum through two complementary channels: the more abstract and conceptual aspects have been woven into Mathematics, while the more concrete and applied elements find their place within Technology. Although this solution does not establish informatics as a standalone subject—which would have required a more complex legislative process—it now provides the legal framework needed to offer students a comprehensive education in the scientific principles underlying the digital world.
The shift in perspective is a radical one. As the official documents make clear, the goal is not to produce passive users of technology, but informed citizens capable of critically understanding how the computing systems that permeate every aspect of contemporary society actually work. The reform aims to develop fundamental skills in young people, not just to use digital technology, but to understand, evaluate, and, when necessary, create it.
This turning point aligns with broader European Union (EU) directives. In November 2023, the Council of the EU published Recommendation C/2024/1030, calling on member states to improve the provision of digital skills training. With this reform, Italy aligns itself with countries such as the United Kingdom, which introduced compulsory computing education as early as 2014, and responds to the strategic need to close the skills gap in an era shaped by artificial intelligence (AI).
The rise of generative AI itself raises new questions. Some might wonder whether, in a world where systems capable of writing software autonomously are already available, teaching this subject still makes sense. The experts' answer is unequivocal: even in the most advanced scenarios, AI tools will only be able to support — not replace — the people involved in developing and managing software systems. Strategic direction, understanding context and objectives, and the ability to adapt systems to changing needs will remain human tasks. These require that symbolic and abstract understanding of the world that only humans possess, and the conceptual and technical ability to develop complex digital systems that only the study of informatics can provide. We will return to this issue in a future article.
The risk, however, is that a lack of public understanding of these dynamics could lead policymakers to withdraw their support for computer science education at the very moment when this competency is becoming most critical. For this reason, cross-party support for this reform is essential to ensure the continuity of a project that will take at least a decade to fully bear fruit.
The new National Guidelines also address the ethical and social challenges associated with technology. The text explicitly stresses the need for students to acquire «an understanding of how systems based on digital technologies function, together with an awareness of their possibilities and limitations, so as to grasp the enormous opportunities for improvement and development they offer society while preventing them from becoming instruments of exclusion or oppression». It reaffirms the fundamental principle that «human beings must maintain control over decisions based on computer systems that can have a significant impact on people».
The real challenge now lies in teacher training. Unlike other disciplines, informatics is not part of the cultural background of most Italian teachers, who studied it neither in school nor at university. The British experience is instructive: after introducing compulsory computing education in 2014, the United Kingdom had to acknowledge in 2017 that much of the curriculum guidance remained unimplemented due to a shortage of adequately trained teachers. The response was the creation, in 2019, of the National Centre for Computing Education, funded with £82 million and continuously refinanced to this day, despite cuts to public spending.
Italy has had access to funds under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), but organizational and time constraints prevented their use in establishing an efficient system for training teachers in informatics education. Strong political will is therefore needed to ensure that this reform does not remain a dead letter. The academic informatics community, which has been bringing the foundations of the field into Italian schools for many years, is ready to contribute. We recall the numerous initiatives already in place, such as the Programma il Futuro project in collaboration with the Ministry of Education and Merit, and the structured research and training activities carried out by the National Laboratory "Informatics and School" of CINI (National Inter-University Consortium for Informatics).
The road will be long and not without obstacles, but the first, fundamental step has been taken. taly has finally recognized that, in an increasingly digital society, the knowledge of the scientific principles of computer science is neither a luxury nor a narrow technical specialization, but rather an essential component of every citizen’s education. Only in this way will it be possible to shape generations capable not only of using technology, but of understanding its implications, assessing its consequences, and maintaining democratic control over systems that profoundly shape our lives.
--The original version (in italian) has been published by "StartMAG" on 3 February 2026.
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