School leaving and wrong paths, the stories of Lorenzo and Adelmo. “Changing the way is possible if someone really helps you choose”

When he became a father, Lorenzo Galletti understood that something had to change. For ten years he had worked as a health worker in the hospital, in an oncological department, between night shifts and heavy rhythms. A profession of value, but now far from what he wanted for himself and for his new family. At 34 he decided to question. And he rediscovered a passion that remained in the shade: the computer science. He thus enrolled in the course for software Developer of the Galdus training body, choosing to invest in the future, his and that of his little girl. At the end of the internship at the 130 Servicing company in Milan, it was hired indefinitely. “I wanted a more stable life and the possibility of really being for my daughter,” he says. Today he has achieved both goals. Today he works with satisfaction in a sector that allows him to reconcile his career and family life.

Among the people who have found in reorientation a new path there is also that of Adelmo Bettoni, 23 years old. After a diploma in the tourist field obtained in Rome, he heard that that path did not do for him. His dream was to start his own business. To do this, he decided to focus everything on information technology and artificial intelligence. Looking for a place where you can train, she arrived in Milan and found a fertile environment for her ideas in Joinus. He attended the course at the Developer for Smart Applications, and from there Chad was born, an app capable of automating daily digital activities through artificial intelligence agents. Chad is designed to simplify life to people with disabilities or difficulties related to age, who often find obstacles to shopping online, book medical examinations, order food, surf the web. An idea as useful as it is ambitious, which will be rewarded at the Expo 2025 in Osaka.

Those of Lorenzo and Adelmo are successful stories of reorientation, which show how it is possible to reconstruct their path even after years of work or a wrong school choice. And it is proper On this type of accompaniment that the challenge against school leaving is played today.

In Lombardy, according to the latest regional data, The school leaving rate stands at 9.9%: It concerns about 259,300 children enrolled in secondary schools for the school year 2024-2025. A number that includes both explicit abandonments and the most insidious forms of implicit dispersion, that is, when the student continues to attend without however reaching the minimum skills provided.

The causes are manifold: socio-economic and family fragility, school paths that are not very close to personal interests, Difficulty of inclusion for students with migratory backgrounds or special educational needs, support deficiency in decision -making moments.

It is precisely to respond to these critical issues that Joinus Milan was bornan innovative hub inaugurated in May 2025 by Galdus with the support of schools, businesses and actors of the third sector. It is a multifunctional space where the culture of work meets school and professional orientation.

The Lombardy Region considers Joinus a model to be enhanced and spread. “Orienting young people towards personal, school and professional growth paths is one of the fundamental missions of our region“, Said the councilor Simona Tironi. “The Hub Joinus Milano focuses on the people, their dreams and the skills necessary to transform them into reality”.

For this reason, in the coming months a new measure will start in support of the orientation, training and the meeting between school and the world of work, in synergy with the third sector: a support for orientation cannot be limited only to the time of school or professional choice, but must be a continuous path. Because recognizing that you have the wrong road is often the first step in a right direction.