The European training week of the Erasmus+ KA220-HED project PrEcIOUS – Promoting pluralistic education in European universities to combat invisible discrimination related to LGBTQIA+ has just wrapped up in Siena. Five days of intense work brought together students from Italy, Greece, Poland, and Lithuania to imagine and design a more inclusive, equitable, and welcoming university for every identity.
Through workshops on stereotypes and bias, inclusive communication, social context analysis, and civic literacy, participants tackled the theme of invisible homophobia within academic environments. “We are proud of the materials we’ve developed,” said Alessandra Viviani, lecturer at the University of Siena and scientific coordinator of the project. “They helped us expose forms of often overlooked discrimination and raise awareness within the academic community. But what struck us most was the maturity with which students embraced the complexity of these issues and turned them into concrete proposals.”
Among the initiatives developed during the week were Instagram campaigns promoting mental health and countering microaggressions, the introduction of gender-neutral bathrooms and inclusive language in institutional documents, university badges including preferred names (aliases), and LGBTQIA+ awareness weeks on campus. These proposals emerged from mutual listening and shared reflection, as Gaia Ciccarelli, project tutor, highlighted: “We witnessed students not only learning, but also unlearning. They questioned the norms of their home environments, engaged with diverse perspectives and together discovered new ways of understanding university life.”
The experience left a lasting impact on participants. Maria Vittoria Moncada Hernandez and Piyarat Punpoosa, students at the University of Siena, described it as “an invaluable experience of personal and cultural growth.” For them, inclusion is no longer an abstract concept, but a daily responsibility embodied in the simplest actions: listening, understanding, and acting.
Launched in 2022 and running through 2025, the PrEcIOUS project is grounded in the belief that higher education must be a space for democracy and pluralism. Alessandra Viviani concludes, “Our goal now is to take these outcomes beyond the partner universities and contribute to building a truly inclusive European culture.”
For more information: www.preciousproject.eu
By Ilenia Costa
