BitPolito, a team of students from the Polytechnic University of Turin (Italian: Politecnico di Torino), the oldest public technical university in Italy, has announced an educational project to introduce Web3 education to Italian high schools.
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The group of more than thirty cryptocurrency enthusiasts and software developers, with academic advisor Prof. Danilo Bazzanella, have already started their BitGeneration program with ten meetings targeting thirty third to fifth-grade students from one of the local high schools. Riccardo Masutti, Daniela Brozzoni, Giacomo Zucco, Alekos Filini and Riccardo Giorgio Frega, the Italian cryptocurrency sphere influencers, are some of the speakers participating in BitGeneration.
The series of BitGeneration events started on January 31 with Zucco's lecture, who shared his impressions with Bitcoin Magazine:
“The teachers were enthusiastic. When they asked me some questions after the lecture, about one-third of the students gathered around to listen. I found bright faces despite the three-hour lecture.”
BitPolito has integrated both theory and practice in the classes, with comprehensive lectures on all possible aspects of Bitcoin, touching on its technological, economic, and social aspects. The practical workshops focus on mining and using a Bitcoin wallet.
In the press release shared with Bitcoin Magazine, the BitPolito team emphasized that BitGeneration's collaboration with the educational institution is formal. The school has included thirty hours of training in its three-year mandatory program for high school students known as the Pathway for Transversal Skills and Orientation (PCTO).
Another group member, Nicolò Terranova, said BitPolito wants to create a documentary about the BitGeneration educational experience from the students' perspective. The Bitcoin activists hope their example will motivate other schools to include Bitcoin in their curricula and promise to support them in the modernization of their educational programs. The team also plans to share the ten BitGenration lessons on BitPolito's YouTube channel with anyone who wants to learn for free.
Meanwhile, interest in Web3 technologies is growing not only among students but also among their parents. In 2022, Study.com, a personalized learning platform that offers flexible and affordable tutoring, conducted a survey specifically targeting parents.
It turned out that about 64% of parents agreed with the importance of cryptocurrency education. Blockchain and metaverse technologies were less popular topics, with 40% and 35% of respondents, respectively, wanting their children to learn these topics at school. At the same time, the majority of parents were not particularly interested in including the subject of NFT in the curriculum. Only 25% of them found this topic important for their children.
Views on the best time to start crypto education varied widely from a group of 6% of respondents who wanted children to learn about cryptocurrencies at preschool age to 19% of parents who believed this subject is more appropriate for college graduates. Still, 24% of survey participants believed that high school is the best time for this.
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Furthermore, the platform offered the same questionnaire to its users with college degrees. The results were quite similar to parents' opinions, especially those regarding cryptocurrencies as the most significant topic related to Web3 technology. The same group of 24% of the survey participants believed that high school was the best place to start crypto education. However, the majority, 33% of participants, thought a college education was a better time to learn about crypto.
Finally, the platform reported that "86% of college graduates think they would be making more money if they had formal knowledge of the new currencies and tech innovations on the internet instead of their college degree."
