Whether intercultural education fails or thrives depends not just on policies, but on the teachers implementing them. Drawing on fieldwork in Italy, Irene Landini shows how inclusive practices emerge — or falter — depending on school leadership, discretion, and innovation
Europe is grappling with changing demographics and polarised debates over identity. As it does so, schools have become more than learning spaces: they are now frontline arenas for shaping social cohesion. In Italy, where cultural and linguistic diversity is rising, this challenge is especially demanding.
UNESCO, the Council of Europe, and the European Commission all promote intercultural education as a necessary response to diversity. But in Italy, recent reforms signal a return to curricula centred on national identity and Western heritage. This contradiction — between everyday diversity and narrowing educational narratives — raises critical questions. How do schools implement intercultural education? And what role do teachers play?
These questions drove my research in Trento, where schools enjoy autonomy under a decentralised education system. I studied two school clusters with high numbers of students from migrant backgrounds. While both schools formally supported intercultural education, they enacted it in sharply varying ways. This difference, I found, hinges on local leadership, policy clarity, and access to resources.
To make sense of this, I turned to Street-Level Bureaucracy (SLB) theory, which sees frontline workers — like teachers — as the real implementers of public policy. These professionals must often interpret, adapt, or even bend policy in response to the realities they face. They exercise ‘discretion’, which can lead to practices that either comply with or diverge from formal policy goals.
In the first school, resource shortages — especially a lack of linguistic facilitators to help non-Italian-speaking students — forced teachers into tough choices. Many sacrificed time meant for intercultural activities to focus on language support. In some cases, they even volunteered extra hours themselves to help students catch up. Their actions were well intentioned. But this coping strategy often reduced the approach to mere language learning, stripping it of its intercultural dimension.
Resource shortages can force teachers into tough choices. Many sacrifice time meant for intercultural activities to focus on language support
Moreover, vague policy guidelines at EU, local and national level often leave teachers guessing. Without clear instructions or practical examples, some default to what’s familiar or urgent — like language acquisition. Others avoid intercultural activities altogether to sidestep potential pushback from Italian parents who might see them as distractions from ‘core’ academic content.
School leadership played a crucial role. The local headteacher recognised the challenges but did not fully exploit the school's autonomy or the powers Italian national law grants headteachers to seek solutions.
The second school enjoyed a proactive headteacher and slightly more resources, including more facilitators to support non-Italian-speaking students. The school also provided teacher training sessions aimed at clarifying intercultural guidelines. These sessions helped teachers navigate the often vague or abstract policy language and understand their own roles within intercultural frameworks.
Teachers felt more confident and better equipped to implement activities aligned with intercultural goals — such as classroom debates on cultural identity, peer tutoring, and projects exploring students’ family heritage. In these classrooms, intercultural education was not merely an optional extra, but an integral part of the daily teaching practice. One teacher told me:
'Just a few weeks ago, a Pakistani girl came to school wearing a headscarf and traditional clothing. Some of the boys started teasing her, so I decided to pause the lesson and try to open a discussion, or at least encourage some shared reflection, on different religious customs and the importance of understanding them. The girl explained that no one had forced her — it was her choice — and she shared her reasons with us. It was really interesting. I think her classmates also gave it some thought afterwards.'
Teachers aren’t passive conduits of policy. Their decisions shape what intercultural education looks like in practice
Much existing research on intercultural education overlooks the implementation process. It assumes that intercultural activities are already happening effectively, or that schools are naturally equipped to apply these principles. But I show that teachers aren’t merely passive conduits of policy. Their interpretations, constraints, and decisions shape what intercultural education looks like in practice. And those decisions are deeply influenced by context.
Surprisingly, some of the most innovative intercultural practices emerged from necessity. In one school, facilitators began involving relatives or community leaders from migrant communities to help teach Italian. What started as a workaround for staff shortages evolved into a rich, community-driven intercultural experience. Facilitators soon began organising activities in students’ native languages, improving learning outcomes, fostering dialogue — and cultivating pride. These bottom-up innovations demonstrate how frontline educators can reshape and enrich policy through creativity.
Bottom-up innovations demonstrate how frontline educators can reshape and enrich policy through creativity
A growing strand of SLB literature sees frontline workers not as policy enforcers, but as policy innovators. They experiment, adapt, and sometimes transform policy through creative responses to real-world constraints. In Trento, some teachers formalised collaborations with community members by lobbying for paid contracts. Others used peer tutoring to foster intercultural bonds among students — turning a necessity into a learning opportunity. This shows what is possible when discretion enriches, rather than bypasses, policy.
My findings align with broader research on co-production, which argues that public services are most effective when communities are involved not just as recipients, but as co-creators. In the classrooms of Trento, we see this principle in action.
So, what can we learn?
First, implementation is not linear. To bridge the gap between ambitious policy and classroom reality, we must support the conditions in which teachers work. That means investing in training, resources, and reflective space — not just writing better policies.
Second, teachers are not passive executors, but frontline policy-makers. Recognising their agency is key to transforming schools into spaces of genuine inclusion.
As many countries in Europe double down on national narratives in education, intercultural approaches offer a much-needed counterbalance. Schools must foster a shared future, not reinforce divisions. To help them do so, we must back the people already doing that work — quietly, creatively, and every day.
